The Circular Health Economy

 

Community Health Creation, feeding into Professional Education​

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Health is made at home, not in hospitals, and the majority of modern-day diseases are driven by diet and lifestyle. The factors playing into this are complex and encompass the commercial, social and behvioural, however Humanising Healthcare is looking to come up with more simple solutions to generate health in local communities.​​​

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Our Phase 3 Development Plan sets out how we will re-purpose a plot of derelict urban land to turn it into a Community Health Creation Space, where health education, outdoor learning, and wholesome social gatherings can drive the beginings of a health generating community.  This will include establishing a market garden, building a community sauna, and a meeting space for group learning. 

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Leveraging Humanising Healthcare's unique position of student contact via the converstaion cafe, alongside well-established, trusted relationships with recovery community organisations, we will launch a free health creation teaching platform which will offer knowledge and practical skills for the implementation of health education in the local community. This adresses the enormous lifestyle medicine gaps in the current medical curriculum, whilst recruiting a body of knowledgeable 'health creators', able to help facilitate Humanising Healthcare's program of health education sessions at the purpose built space.

 

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Why this matters now: 

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Health inequality in Scotland is severe, and widening. People living in Scotland's most deprived areas can expect to live 13.2 fewer years (men) and 10.5 fewer years (women) than those in the least deprived areas — and the gap in healthy life expectancy is even starker, at around 20.8 years for men and 23.4 years for women. This means people in deprived communities don't just die younger — they spend a far smaller share of their lives in good health.

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Yet medical training gives this almost no attention. UK medical students receive an average of around 22 hours of nutrition teaching across a curriculum of roughly 4,000 total teaching hours — under 1% of their training — despite lifestyle-related conditions accounting for a large share of what they'll treat as doctors. Root Cause Care exists to close that gap, equipping future clinicians with tools that go beyond the prescription pad.

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We're currently developing the site and funding case to bring this space to life. If you'd like to know more about partnering with us or supporting this work, get in touch.

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