Ecological Bodies and Relational Anatomies: Toward a Transversal Foundation for Planetary Health Education

Abstract

As planetary health education enters medical and health professional training, transversal implementation across curricula is critical in developing its full potential and enabling future health professionals to meet the social, environmental, and health challenges of current and future generations in an integrated manner. To advance the transversal implementation of planetary health education, our study proceeded through: (1) a sequence analysis of documents framing physiotherapy education to identify relevant nexus points; (2) an explorative implementation of planetary health into foundational anatomy and physiology modules identified as critical nexus points; (3) practical implementation during the 2021 autumn semester. Implementation in the operative foundations of healthcare education—anatomy and physiology—enables the emphasis of the ecological nature of human bodies and interconnection with our planetary environment. Musculoskeletal joints accentuate the relational nature of bodies highlighted across current research and traditional knowledges, as dynamically pervaded and in interaction with culture, technology, objects, ideas, plants, planets, etc. Teaching relational anatomies thus highlights planetary health as the transversal foundation of medical and healthcare education. Making this foundation more explicit will be critical for the transversal implementation of planetary health education and subsequent practice, as well as the fundamental shifts in our understanding of human lives and health they require.

Motor control and skill acquisition in pediatric physical therapy: an enactive proposal

“…In this view, the center of knowing resides in the mind (Thornquist and Kirkengen, 2015). Related to physical therapy, the current theoretical underpinning of physical therapy education is largely organized around a biomechanical view of the body, i.e., the body-as-a-machine, detached from cultural, social, and contextual surroundings (Nicholls, 2017;Maric and Nicholls, 2020;Richter and Maric, 2022). From the Cartesian view the main property of matter/body is its spatial extension while the property of mind is its capacity to think.…”

“…2023.1226593 Frontiers in Psychology 04 frontiersin.org limbs, etc. Richter and Maric (2022). Such an epistemological split between a subjective and objective reality, between the world within and the world outside, separates the knower, i.e., the subject and her interior awareness, from the known, i.e., the exterior reality/the object of knowledge (Varela et al, 1991).…”

Exploring the potential of a standardized test in physiotherapy: making emotion, embodiment, and therapeutic alliance count for women with chronic pelvic pain

“…Herein lies the implication of a reductionistic view in physiotherapy where the functional significance of the body is reduced to the musculoskeletal system, covering mechanical properties, not including that mental and social factors affect movement. Critical voices warn that in assessments of the body as a strictly functional biological entity (Nicholls and Gibson, 2010;Richter and Maric, 2022), there is a risk that health professionals may overlook the communicative and expressive body (Thornquist, 2006). Haugstad et al (2006) applied the Standard Mensendieck test studying the clinical characteristics of women with chronic pelvic pain.…”