Climate change: what competencies and which medical education and training approaches?

The paper describes what kinds of competencies for climate change might be included in medical education and training. It explores which curricula, teaching, learning and assessment approaches might be involved. Rather than arguing for major changes to medical education and training, this paper explores well established precedents to offer practical suggestions for where a particular kind of literacy--eco-medical literacy--and related competencies could be naturally integrated into existing elements of medical education and training.The health effects of climate change have, generally, not yet been integrated into medical education and training systems. However, the necessary competencies could be taught by building on existing models, best practice and innovative traditions in medicine. Even in crowded curricula, climate change offers an opportunity to reinforce and extend understandings of how interactions between people and place affect health.Health workforce development for climate change has become a pressing matter. It is an emerging priority in international policy guidelines for health workforce development produced by the Global Health Workforce Alliance [1] and has featured in recent international policy forums such as the 2008 Geneva Health Forum. The work of the World Health Organisation now includes a focus on the ways in which global health issues such as climate change can be included in health workforce education programs for developing countries. Developed countries are also beginning to include health workforce development for climate change in their national policy statements. For example, education and training of the health workforce features in the UK Department of Health guidance document The health impact of climate change: promoting sustainable communities [2]. Health workforce development is identified as a priority area in the USA's sentinel policy statement, the CDC Policy on Climate Change and Public Health [3]. Australia's premier poli