You are here

Article Text

Article menu
Download PDFPDF
Editorial
How neurologists can care better on a changing planet
  1. James Bashford1,2,
  2. Anjum Misbahuddin3,
  3. Jan Coebergh4,5
  1. 1 Maurice Wohl Clinical Neuroscience Institute, King's College London, London, UK
  2. 2 Neurology, King's College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, London, UK
  3. 3 Essex Centre for Neurological Sciences, Barking Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals NHS Trust, Romford, UK
  4. 4 Neurology, St George's University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, London, UK
  5. 5 Neurology, Ashford and Saint Peter's Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Chertsey, UK
  1. Correspondence to Dr James Bashford; james.bashford{at}kcl.ac.uk

https://doi.org/10.1136/pn-2024-004295

Statistics from Altmetric.com

    Request Permissions

    If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.

    Given that 2023 was the hottest year on record globally, climate change is increasingly obvious for all to see. This editorial explores why neurologists should care about this, and how they can care better for their patients in the face of it.

    But where does one start? As climate change science consolidates the enormity of the problem, how can we make a tangible difference? We need only to reflect on the already apparent devastation to health, homes and livelihoods of some of the less privileged around the world. But even developed countries in temperate regions, such as the UK, have seen record-high temperatures and devastating floods in recent years. Clearly, the physical and psychological health effects of climatic extremes are not restricted to the most susceptible global regions.

    Climate change is causing warmer summers and winters the world over. With this comes higher humidity, leading to wetter winters and more intense rainfall events, even in summer. The result is more heatwaves, floods, storms, droughts and wildfires. And as the climate crisis deepens, doctors wield a significant sphere of influence in society.1 When it comes to neurology, there are two …

    View Full Text

    Footnotes

    • Contributors JB and AM drafted the article. All authors edited and approved the final version. JB is the guarantor.

    • Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Provenance and peer review Commissioned; externally peer reviewed by Sanjay Sisodiya, London, UK.

    Linked Articles

    • Highlights from this issue
      Editors' commentary
      Philip Smith Geraint N Fuller
      Practical Neurology 2024; 24 445-445 Published Online First: 17 Nov 2024. doi: 10.1136/pn-2024-004387