This is the second year that the Public and Environmental Health Special Interest Group (PEHSIG) has been established under the auspices of IFEM. Since we were officially established in Amsterdam, we have continued to grow, now more than 80 members strong, from all around the world.

The IFEM PEHSIG vision is to create a group within the international emergency care community that promotes best practice, education, research, advocacy, and collaboration about public and environmental health as it relates to emergency care.

In addition to growing our membership, in 2024 we published our first White Paper on Climate Change and Ecological Crisis, which was published in the Canadian Journal of Emergency Medicine. On April 7, we celebrated World Health Day with dispatches from our global members, who reflected on the top 3 priorities in Global Health. Some of the more popular objectives were improving health inequality, do more to reduce global warming and reduce climate change impacts on health.

Also in April 2024, a delegation of the PEH-SIG went to Buenos Aires for the 1st Latin American Congress on Emergency Medicine (FLAME), and presented to an audience from all over Latin America and beyond. The topics included climate change and healthcare, Choosing wisely and healthcare sustainability and Domestic violence: challenges and solution. Information was exchanged, collaborations forged, and research and projects shared.

Our members have been busy with presentations, webinars and advocacy events this year. In June, we met and celebrated in Taiwan at ICEM 2024, successfully delivered two concurrent sessions, one on Public Health and the other on Climate Change and Health, and two marketplace stalls, one on Green/Sustainable ED and the other on Modern Slavery. In September, Dr. Gayle Galletta, the PEH-SIG membership director, co-authored a resolution that was unanimously accepted by the American College of Emergency Physicians, advocating for the use of tap water to irrigate wounds in the emergency department, with the potential of eliminating the use of millions of plastic bottles of sterile water or saline. In November, our Chair, Dr Lai Heng Foong, attended the African Federation of Emergency Medicine conference in Botswana. She presented a poster on the Building Community Resilience in Disasters Toolkit that she developed, discussing the applicability of this toolkit in Africa.  She also presented a talk on the impacts of climate events on emergency departments.  It was an opportunity to meet with emergency doctors, paramedics and nurses in Africa, and share knowledge and plan future collaborations. Our Vice-Chair, Dr Sandy Robertson has been busy as Co-lead of the Green ED framework, extending to all EDs in Wales in the UK, as well as going international with a launch in a few pilot sites in the state of New South Wales, Australia.

As we look forward to 2025, we hope that our membership will continue to grow. The PEH-SIG commits to improving the delivery of emergency care globally, and to address health inequities, not just in patient health outcomes, but also in IFEM representation of emergency medicine from low and middle resource countries. We have advocated strongly to increase representation of LMIC by extending free or reduced registrations for ICEM and the webinars that IFEM organises. We welcome anyone and everyone with an interest in public and/or environmental health to join our dynamic SIG. Learn more about our SIG here.

White paper on Climate and Ecological Crisis
Endorsed by IFEM
Download

World Health Day
Compilation of dispatches from our members all over the world.

ICEM Taiwan, 2024
Marketplace
We had two marketplace stalls, one on Sustainable Healthcare, and another on Modern Slavery and Emergency Departments.

Concurrent sessions

Public Health

We had broad representation of speakers from India, Australia, Philippines and United Kingdom.  The topics covered included Domestic violence, Modern Slavery, Public Health as a solution to access block, Occupational health and Migrant health.

Environmental Health

We had speakers from USA, Australia, New Zealand talking about Health sustainability, Choosing wisely and reducing low value care.

1^st Latin American Congress on Emergency Medicine