(gentle music) - Biophilia is a wonderful concept that we as humans are wired to be connected to nature.

There's something that happens when we see or participate in nature that's good for our bodies.

(gentle music) At Mayo, we've probably had 20 years worth of evaluations of biophilia, a lot more in depth, probably in the last five years.

When you get into nature, it can have direct effects on things like hypertension.

So high blood pressure can very specifically be shown to come down several points just by getting into nature on a regular basis.

Anything that's stress related, could be headaches, could be back pain, could be just that general sensation of stress, probably has the potential to be benefited by getting into nature.

Children with autism who are brought into a city environment and they may be a little more outdoors or into a park, they'll actually have better memory retension, they'll actually have better behavior when they're exposed to nature.

So we know it's really important for young children to be exposed to nature.

It has a lot to do with how their brains develop.

We also know at the other end of the spectrum, very elderly folks who are brought out into a nature setting, better memory, better mood, better blood pressure control.

You're familiar, obviously, with physicians telling us what to do, right?

We have lots of recommendations for you.

It carries a little more weight when I can write a prescription and say, "Please get this filled and take it."

And that works for medications.

Turns out it works that way to get patients into the park.

We can go online, pick a park that's in the patient's area and say, "Hmm, here's a nice park two miles away from your home.

I'm gonna write a prescription for three times a week, 30 minutes at a time, to go out there and take a walk."

(gentle music) You are a Rochester patient and we said, "Eh, I really want you to, you know, get in the parks more."

These are all the Rochester parks.

And we might look and say, "Oh, you're close to Game Haven," so I'll add that.

This is what would print out, or I could send it electronically.

Then there's the link.

You can actually take it off your phone and say, "Yep, I went through and I did it."

It gives you the link to the Game Haven Reservoir Park.

And so now we've taken it from, "I think you should get outside more," to something where you're actually gonna be out a lot more, hopefully.

There's interesting studies that say if we get about two hours per week, that's actually a sweet spot.

If we get less, it's still beneficial, but about two hours.

Well, that's not terribly hard for most of us.

Our culture has really lost connection to nature.

So it's amazing how many people come back and said, "That was one of the most impressive things I've learned from medicine, because it put me back in connection with nature."

We're also very interested in how to get biophilia benefits without it going outside, 'cause not everybody can get outside.

If you've just had a a hip surgery, you're probably not walking outside today.

But we can bring nature into the hospital room.

We've done studies just bringing in recordings of nature in woods like this.

And just playing it through the room can actually shorten length of stay, can reduce pain, can improve satisfaction.

One of the original studies in this whole realm was done back in the early '80s.

And this was looking at patients who had cholecystectomy, or gallbladder surgeries, similar patients and similar hospitals, same surgeons.

And some of the patients had a room that looked out to a brick wall.

And some of the patients had a room where the windows looked out to some shrubbery and trees.

And they just tracked those two groups of patients to see if there was any difference.

And, again, probably not surprising now, but at that time I think fairly striking.

The people who could see some kind of natural element had less pain, were easier to care for, and actually got out of the hospital a little earlier.

If you look at studies where patients have very severe depression, they're hospitalized.

They'd looked at one half of similar patients whose room did not get natural sunlight, and they looked at a group of the same type of patients who got natural sunlight.

And guess who gets out of the hospital sooner at a significant level?

Patients who have natural sunlight.

This isn't just for medicine.

There's interesting studies on productivity, right?

We're all about productivity in this day and age.

They looked at employees in buildings all doing basically the same job.

Telephone calls or telephone center, for example.

And there's some that have outside offices that look into the yards or , you know, brushes outside.

Then there's an inner group that doesn't see quite as much.

And then there's an inner inner group that had no visual content or contact to the outside.

And guess who's more productive?

The folks who have windows, who are doing exactly the same job, eight or 9% more productivity.

If you think about all the things we can do that get us outside the office.

So now we're seeing, of course, walking meetings, we're seeing people do therapy, right?

If we're gonna sit and have a conversation and learn about each other, and I'm gonna try and help you through a therapeutic relationship, can I do that while we walk together?

Turns out we can.

We have many people who live in places where this isn't quite as easy as walking out your back door.

So having plants in the office, having natural elements like wood and stone inside your building can actually have some of the same benefits.

Or I may even just use pictures.

There's interesting studies that if you look at a picture of an nature scene, it can have significant impact on your blood pressure, your heart rate variability, those markers of stress.

If you went back 25 or 30 years ago, there was a lot of debate and it was sort of us versus them.

There was the things that were different or alternative.

Massage, acupuncture, a lot of herbs, people from, at least the medical side, we tended to think of those things as they're out there.

Here's real medicine, this is where the the action is.

And then as we learned more and said, "I can actually reduce your pain if we get you into massage program.

We can see your blood pressure improve if we use acupuncture."

So as we got the evidence, what we've seen is a very nice gradual acceptance and now recognition that part of that lifestyle approach is absolutely integral to what we do from a conventional, if you will, medical practice.

We don't wanna just be the pill pusher or here's a quick fix, we really wanna solve problems.

We wanna work with our patients to optimize their health and wellness, even in the midst of disease.

I think we have to be sensitive currently to the expense of medicine in this country.

It's become outrageous for many patients to afford basic medications and so forth.

So if we do have something in our toolkit that can actually help address your blood pressure without adding yet another pill, why would we not do that?

We do better when we're connected to nature and whether that's financial or health or just general feeling better, it's a great argument for all of us to try and find more time in nature.

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