Prescribing parkrun: medicalising a walk in the park | The BMJ

The National Academy for Social Prescribing has recently announced that over 1800 general practices have joined “the parkrun practice initiative,” saying that this has “proven highly effective in promoting preventative care, particularly for patients facing barriers to physical activity.”1 And so, GPs are now “prescribing parkrun” for their patients.2 Parkrun is an exceptional phenomenon. I wrote about it in The BMJ in 2015.3 At that time, 50 000 or so people were taking part weekly. Essentially, it’s an organised, timed, and free 5 km run, jog, walk, or wheel on Saturday mornings—in parks, on beaches, or on trails around the world but mainly in the UK, where it originated. I love parkrun and believe that it can make a real difference to public health. It’s free, outdoors, community focused, and easy to join in: all good things. Parkrun has some paid staff, but the work of setting up, timing, and processing results is done by local volunteer teams. Around 200 000 people now take part e

The National Academy for Social Prescribing has recently announced that over 1800 general practices have joined “the parkrun practice initiative,” saying that this has “proven highly effective in promoting preventative care, particularly for patients facing barriers to physical activity.”1 And so, GPs are now “prescribing parkrun” for their patients.2 Parkrun is an exceptional phenomenon. I wrote about it in The BMJ in 2015.3 At that time, 50 000 or so people were taking part weekly. Essentially, it’s an organised, timed, and free 5 km run, jog, walk, or wheel on Saturday mornings—in parks, on