Planetary Health in Nursing: A Scoping Review

Aim

To map the extent of the use of the term ‘planetary health’ in peer-reviewed nursing literature.

Design

Scoping Review.

Data Sources

CINAHL, ProQuest Nursing & Allied Health Premium, MEDLINE, APA PsycINFO, ProQuest Dissertations & Theses and Web of Science were searched in January and February 2024 for English and French-language publications. A follow-up search was conducted on 10 June 2024 to determine if additional literature was published.

Review Methods

A scoping review was conducted using the Arksey and O'Malley methodology for scoping reviews. To be included the article had to explicitly use the term ‘planetary health’ and ‘nursing’ or ‘nurses’.

Results

Sixty-eight articles met the criteria for the scoping review and were included in this review, with the majority published between 2017 and 2024. Predominant literature included discussion papers, commentaries and editorials. A lack of original research is apparent. Most of the publications were calls to action for nurses to advance planetary health in nursing education, practice, research and advocacy work.

Conclusions

Literature confirms that planetary health is a recent and an important topic in nursing, and nurses have a well-documented role to play in planetary health, given the numerous calls to action in nursing leadership, education, practice and research. There is a need to publish the essential work nurses are doing in planetary health in various nursing domains.

Impact

This scoping review revealed a clear and urgent call to action for nurses to address planetary health. Given this finding, nurses have a responsibility to advocate for a planetary health approach in the profession and take action to contribute to planetary health through education, research, practice and advocacy.