Implementation of training activities
Training other health-care professionals
This process involved giving lectures, leading tutorials, writing articles, and engaging in training programmes. The focus was on clinical history taking and clinical and community interventions.
Training within existing programmes
Some of our trainers worked within existing organisational structures (eg, community health worker organisations, primary care nurse groups, medical school, and public health courses) to teach about clinical presentations, community interventions, and air pollution.
Community interventions
Some trainers engaged in community projects. An example of this was a trainer who worked with engineers to build low-cost air pollution sensors, and then placed these at health centres. The air pollution data generated was used to train the health centre staff, educate patients in the community using a citizen science approach, and to advocate for transdisciplinary action to reduce community sources of air pollution.
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- Jan van Oldenborgh G
- Krikken F
- Lewis S
- et al.
Attribution of the Australian bushfire risk to anthropogenic climate change.
Other trainers conducted programmes to teach both teachers and their students in the schools in their communities.
Network development
Some trainers established networks within existing medical and health-care societies to promote air health issues.
Tool development
One trainer used her time to develop a massive open online course (MOOC) on planetary health in Brazil, which includes a module on air pollution. This Brazilian Portuguese version was evaluated, relaunched, and translated into English to be accessible to a wider audience.
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- Floss M
- Vieira Ilgenfritz CA
- Rodrigues YE
- et al.
Development and assessment of a Brazilian pilot massive open online course in planetary health education: an innovative model for primary care professionals and community training.
This MOOC also served as the template for the WONCA Planetary Health in Primary Care MOOC, which MF and several others helped to develop.
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WONCA Online
Global family doctor. Planetary health for primary care.
Outreach via media
This included giving television and radio interviews, creating podcasts, and running social media campaigns on platforms such as Facebook.
Conducting research
Several trainers worked on air pollution research projects, including a survey of barriers to implementing technologies to reduce household air pollution among mothers and pregnant women (building on previous research),
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- Wigfall C
- Ganbat M
- Badarch J
- Warburton D
- Crano WD
Implementing attitudes measurement to influence winter air pollution mask wearing by pregnant women in Ulaanbaatar: a pilot study.
,
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- Badarch J
- Harding J
- Dickinson-Craig E
- et al.
Winter air pollution from domestic coal fired heating in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, is strongly associated with a major seasonal cyclic decrease in successful fecundity.
a project to assess children’s exposure to air pollution in the different places where they spend their time, and an intervention project to address indoor air pollution exposure in a state penitentiary. Several trainers also wrote reviews.
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- Urrutia-Pereira M
- Mello-da-Silva CA
- Solé D
Household pollution and COVID-19: irrelevant association?.
,
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- Rosário Filho NA
- Urrutia-Pereira M
- D’Amato G
- et al.
Air pollution and indoor settings.
,
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- Khandker S
- Ahmad A
- Mcgushin A
- et al.
Air pollution in Bangladesh and its consequences.