Social prescribing can reduce need for some medications

Social prescribing – such as encouraging people to visit parks, green spaces or the countryside – can help to lower the use of psychotropic, antihypertensive and asthma medication in urban environments, a study has concluded.

The research by the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare has argued that visiting such spaces three to four times a week can cut people’s chances of needing medication for mental health problems or high blood pressure by a third, and for asthma by about a quarter.

Importantly, these positive effects were stronger among those reporting lowest annual household incomes.

The study, published in the journal Occupational & Environmental Medicine, analysed responses of 16,000 randomly selected residents of three Finnish cities: Helsinki, Espoo and Vantaa.

The researchers gathered information on how city dwellers aged at least 25-years-old experienced so-called residential ‘green’ and ‘blue’ spaces within a 1km radius of their homes.

Green spaces in this context included forests, gardens, parks, cemeteries, zoos, natural grasslands, moors and wetlands. Blue spaces included the sea, lakes and rivers.

Respondents were asked to report their use of prescribed drugs for anxiety, insomnia and depression and for high blood pressure and asthma.

This was compared against how often they spent time or exercised outdoors in green spaces between May and September, with options ranging from never to five or more times a week.

The researchers found a strong correlation between visits to green spaces and lower odds of using such prescribed drugs.

Visiting three to four times a week was associated with 33% lower odds of using mental health drugs, 36% lower odds of using blood pressure drugs, and 26% lower odds of using asthma drugs.

Intriguingly, visiting more times than this did not always increase the correlation. Those who visited green spaces at least five times a week were only 22% less likely to be using mental health drugs, and 24% less likely to be using asthma medications.

Increased frequency did correlate to lower odds of needing blood pressure drugs however, with 41% lower probability than someone visiting less than once a week.

“Mounting scientific evidence supporting the health benefits of nature exposure is likely to increase the supply of high-quality green spaces in urban environments and promote their active use,” the researchers wrote. “This might be one way to improve health and welfare in cities.”