Collaborating to Overcome the Barriers to Implementing Planetary Health Education for Medical Students: The International Medical Education Collaboration on Climate and Sustainability (IMECCS)

Abstract

Medical education is lagging behind advances in planetary health knowledge due to the considerable barriers to introducing new topics into medical curricula. This potentially leaves doctors of the future ill-equipped to deal with the health challenges associated with environmental degradation. The recently conceived ‘infusion’ approach by the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, USA, represents a promising method for integrating planetary health topics into medical education. Adopting this approach, the International Medical Education Collaboration on Climate and Sustainability (IMECCS) was founded, with the goal of empowering healthcare students and faculty members worldwide to integrate planetary health education into their curricula. IMECCS consists of medical students and faculty members at universities in the USA, UK, and Honduras with experience in introducing planetary health topics into medical curricula. Based on discussions of challenges and successes, the group created an online open-access resource bank designed to enable a medical student or faculty member, without prior experience, to implement a planetary health curriculum and infuse these topics into existing teaching sessions at their institution.