or the last 40 years, the nutrition dictionaries have formally listed Vitamin G as an obsolete name for riboflavin, or Vitamin B2. In 2006, Dutch health scientist Dr. Peter P. Groenewegen and colleagues coined the term ‘Vitamin G’ to refer to the medicinal influence of greenspace.
Primary care doctors,
psychiatrists, psychologists and other allied health professionals are now beginning to write
formal prescriptions for Vitamin G, with specified amounts of exercise or time spent in urban greenspace, gardens, arboretums and forests.
Savvy ’scripts
The savviest prescribers provide specific details in
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prescriptions: walking, hiking, gardening, and opportunities for solitude and contemplation
in green locations.
Vitamin G prescriptions are usually served up with instructions on mindfulness, underscoring that the benefits of time spent in nature are amplified if the individual is fully present, in the true sense of the word: strolling through a park while engaged with a smartphone screen may, in fact, cause a Vitamin G deficiency.
“Having a plant within view of an office workstation significantly reduces risk of sick leave.” – Eva M Selhub, MD
Information on this topic is from the book Your Brain On Nature (Wiley, 2012) by co-authors Dr. Eva
Selhub and Dr. Alan Logan.
For more details on the science and the benefits of Vitamin G, click here. H&L |
