The girl had been experiencing chest pains and her worried mother thought she should go to the emergency room, recalled Amanda E. DeCew, a Fair Haven clinic director and pediatric nurse.
The girl “was spending her entire day inside and had been inside for like two weeks,” DeCew said. “But the more we got into her symptoms, the more I really felt like this was anxiety and nothing that she needed to go the emergency room for.”
But DeCew also knew that some kind of medical intervention was needed. “I’m going to write a park prescription for you,” she told the girl. “Just try this for today.”
Medical providers are taking nature therapy seriously
Melanie Stengel :: C-HIT.ORG
Meghan Casey, left, a nursing and public health student at Yale, and Amanda E. DeCew, an advanced practice registered nurse in pediatrics at Fair Haven Community Health Care in New Haven, go for a morning walk along Quinnipiac River Trail on Front Street. DeCew, also the clinic’s director for quality improvement and risk management, became interested in the benefits of nature therapy after hearing a podcast on the topic. She, and a few other colleagues, now prescribe outdoor activities to children and adults when they think it’s appropriate.