Indigenous perspectives on education for sustainable healthcare Nicole Redvers a,b , Clinton Schultz c , Melissa Vera Prince d , Myrna Cunningham e , Rhys Jones f and Be’sha Blondin b a Family and Community Medicine-INMED Program, University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences, Grand Forks, ND, USA; b Arctic Indigenous Wellness Foundation, Yellowknife, Canada; c Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Bond University, Gold Coast, Australia; d School of Nursing, University of Washington’s, Seattle, WA, USA; e Fondo para el Desarrollo de los Pueblos Ind  ıgenas de Am erica Latina y El Caribe (FILAC), La Paz, Bolivia; f Te Kupenga Hauora M aori, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand ABSTRACT A range of global environmental changes are contributing to an increasing global burden of dis- ease. Since human health and well-being are intimately associated with the health of our planet, healthcare providers will not only be charged with caring for this expanding disease burden but will also need to become more environmentally sustainable in their professional practice. There is thus an urgent need in the health professions education community to prioritize environmentally sustainable healthcare practice, which must include and prioritize Indigenous voices and Indigenous knowledge systems. Critical global dialogue on the significance of Indigenous know- ledge systems in educating health professionals for a sustainable future will be required if we are ready to ensure the generations that follow us are able to live healthy lives. Indigenous ways of ‘being’ in the world, which emphasize the importance of interconnection and reciprocal steward- ship with everything in the natural world, are essential for advancing education for sustainable healthcare and overall well-being. Given the colonial legacy however, Indigenous people, despite their essential knowledge systems and abilities, still face many barriers accessing safe decolonizing spaces and presence in health professions education, which needs to be addressed. KEYWORDS Community-oriented; multi- professional; ethics/ attitudes; general Background No problem can be solved from the same consciousness that created it. We have to learn to see the world anew. Einstein (loc. cit. Banathy 1997) Human-caused global environmental changes (GECs) are increasingly disrupting the interconnected ecosystems on which our existence depends. Deforestation, the pollution of our air and waterways, the emergence of new patho- gens and extreme weather events are and will continue to disrupt life if we follow our current consumptogenic life- styles (Jones 2019). With many contributing factors to the GECs being anthropogenic through our reliance on fossil fuels and extractive processes, the healthcare sector requires an urgent reflective process given its contribution of approximately 4.4% of global greenhouse gas emissions (Health Care Without Harm 2019). Thus, not only will healthcare providers and institutions need to care for an expanding global disease burden, they will also be charged with reducing healthcare’s environmental footprint. Despite the breadth of evidence of the interrelationship and inter- dependence of our natural environment and our health and well-being in environmental psychology (Howell et al. 2013), environmental sociology (Beery et al. 2015), public health (Bowler et al. 2010), and Indigenous knowledge studies (Reid et al. 2016), governments and society con- tinue to function in ways that are antithetical to the well- being of the planet and thus to our well-being. Education for sustainable healthcare (ESH) has been conceptualized to address how humans and the environment interact, while emphasizing that human health is dependent on a healthy planet and provides dir- ection for environmental stewardship and sustainable healthcare practices (Walpole et al. 2019). To date, in terms of environmental sustainability, health professions educa- tion (HPE) has generally not moved beyond a mechanistic, anthropocentric approach, which does not therefore take into consideration cross-cultural factors and values (i.e. those of differing worldviews). As an example, in the cur- rent Western paradigm, HPE generally seeks to measure competency. Assessment is based on predetermined ideas of what a student should know or be able to do, which is then measured using various forms of ‘objective’ tests (Barnhardt and Kawagley 2005). In the traditional Practice points  ESH should be rooted within other connected applied knowledge systems (i.e. TK) that give greater meaning and longevity to sustainabil- ity efforts.  Actively increase the availability of pluralistic knowledge systems (i.e. traditional medicine) in HPE in the context of GECs and sustainable healthcare education.  Create safe spaces for decolonized learning in diverse HPE environments. CONTACT Nicole Redvers nicole.redvers@und.edu Family and Community Medicine-INMED Program, University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences, 1301 N Columbia Rd Stop 9037, Grand Forks, ND, 58202-9037, USA ß 2020 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group MEDICAL TEACHER 2020, VOL. 42, NO. 10, 1085–1090 https://doi.org/10.1080/0142159X.2020.1791320