The Climate Wise slides: An evaluation of planetary health lecture slides for medical education

AbstractEducational Challenge There is an urgent need for innovations in planetary health medical education. Physicians must be prepared to provide high-value, low-carbon healthcare for patients increasingly impacted by the health consequences of climate change.Proposed Solution The Climate Wise slides, an evidence-based, open-access pedagogical tool that provides didactic planetary health medical education organized by medical subspecialty, was developed and evaluated by a virtual lecture session that presented a subset of the slides to N = 75 Canadian medical students. Each participant completed a questionnaire before and after the Climate Wise virtual lecture that included multiple choice questions to assess their planetary health knowledge and a rating of their interest in including the Climate Wise slides in medical curricula.Lessons Learned Participants showed significantly improved planetary health knowledge scores (p < 0.0001) and increased interest in including the Climate Wise slides in medical curricula (p < 0.001) after the virtual Climate Wise lecture session. This study demonstrates that the Climate Wise slides are a valuable pedagogical tool to advance planetary health medical education.Next Steps Future directions include evaluating faculty perspectives on the Climate Wise slides, learning outcomes of the slides implemented longitudinally in medical curricula, and developing higher-order problem-based and simulation-based planetary health medical education resources. Given the urgent need for planetary health medical education, we recommend the global sharing of teaching resources to facilitate the rapid upscaling of validated pedagogical tools internationally.Keywords: Climate changeplanetary healthundergraduate medical educationcurriculum development AcknowledgementsThe authors would like to acknowledge the many medical student contributors to the Climate Wise slides.Disclosure statementThe Climate Wise slides are funded by the CFMS Strategic Innovation Fund. The authors declare no conflicts of interest.Additional informationNotes on contributorsOwen Dan LuoOwen Dan Luo, MDCM, Department of Medicine, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada.Candelaria Aristizabal LondonoCandelaria Aristizabal Londono, BKin, College of Medicine, University of Saskatchewan, Regina, SK, Canada.Nicole PrinceNicole Prince, MD, PhD, Department of Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON, Canada.Ericka InyEricka Iny, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada.Tyler WarnockTyler Warnock, MD, Department of Psychiatry, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada.Kayla CropperKayla Cropper, MSc, College of Medicine, University of Saskatchewan, Regina, SK, Canada.Sam GirgisSam Girgis, BKin, College of Medicine, University of Saskatchewan, Regina, SK, Canada.Celia WalkerCelia Walker, MD, MSc, Department of Medicine, University of Alberta, Yellowknife, NT, Canada.