title: River doctors: Learning from medicine to improve ecosystem management.
abstract: Effective ecosystem management requires a robust methodology to analyse, remedy and avoid ecosystem damage. Here we propose that the overall conceptual framework and approaches developed over millennia in medical science and practice to diagnose, cure and prevent disease can provide an excellent template. Key principles to adopt include combining well-established assessment methods with new analytical techniques and restricting both diagnosis and treatment to qualified personnel at various levels of specialization, in addition to striving for a better mechanistic understanding of ecosystem structure and functioning, as well as identifying the proximate and ultimate causes of ecosystem impairment. In addition to applying these principles, ecosystem management would much benefit from systematically embracing how medical doctors approach and interview patients, diagnose health condition, select treatments, take follow-up measures, and prevent illness. Here we translate the overall conceptual framework from medicine into environmental terms and illustrate with examples from rivers how the systematic adoption of the individual steps proven and tested in medical practice can improve ecosystem management.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Science and Technology, University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU), PO Box 644, 48080 Bilbao, Spain. Electronic address: arturo.elosegi@ehu.eus.
authors.forename: Arturo
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Elosegi
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Limnology, Leibniz Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries (IGB), Alte Fischerhütte 2, 16775 Stechlin, Germany; Department of Ecology, Berlin Institute of Technology (TU Berlin), Ernst-Reuter-Platz 1, 10587 Berlin, Germany. Electronic address: gessner@igb-berlin.de.
authors.forename: Mark O
authors.initials: MO
authors.lastname: Gessner
authors.affiliation: Cawthron Institute, Private Bag 2, Nelson, New Zealand. Electronic address: roger.young@cawthron.org.nz.
authors.forename: Roger G
authors.initials: RG
authors.lastname: Young
mesh_terms: D003247:Conservation of Natural Resources / Q000379:methods*; D017753:Ecosystem; D006801:Humans; D045483:Rivers
keywords: Bioassessment; Differential diagnosis; Ecosystem management; Environmental assessment; Medical methodology; Methodological framework; River restoration