What arts in
health does
What is arts in health?
Arts in health is the field that uses artistic practices to support health and wellbeing, and to stimulate positive approaches to health. Arts in health is practiced in different settings and with different strategies to support health. Specially trained artists help patients, staff, informal caregivers, and community members to be actively creative, regardless of previous experience of the arts. Some arts in health programs simply encourage active creativity, while others have medical or therapeutic aims.
Arts in health introduces activities like painting, dancing, or creative writing into health settings to empower people in pursuit of their own wellbeing. Art-making encourages people to identify with their wellness instead of their illness. Arts in health activities might involve anything from observation – for instance listening to music, or looking at a painting – to direct engagement in art-making, for instance writing a poem, or painting, or creative movement.
where is arts in health found?
In care institutions, patients and their loved ones can participate in creative activities at the bedside or in waiting rooms. Also, patients can work with professional arts therapists to achieve particular health goals. Healthcare staff can use creative art-making to rediscover meaning in their work, to encourage a positive environment, and to prevent compassion fatigue. The arts can also encourage positive and productive relationships between caregivers and their patients.
In community centres and at home, art-making encourages social cohesion and health resilience, contributing to illness prevention and healthy living. For those living with chronic illness or disability, art-making builds social connection inclusion.
Why is arts in health important?
Our health system is undergoing a dramatic and necessary transition. Healthcare policy and institutions must shift from the traditional focus on disease, to a vision of person-centred care. The field of arts in health can support that transition. For many patients, the arts can shift their focus from what illness prevents them doing, to a focus on what they can do - actively engaging them with their own wellbeing. In communities, the arts can activate people to pursue healthier lifestyles. The arts can encourage meaning making, playful curiosity, and social connection.
What arts in health does
the building blocks
Practice
Arts in health practice brings creative activities to healthcare institutions and communities, empowering participants in pursuit of their own wellbeing. These activities can range from art-making workshops in, for example, dancing or painting, to more experience-based involvement such as listening to live bedside music. Artists work with patients, caregivers, and community members to facilitate these activities and support both the treatment and prevention of illness.
Education
With special training, arts in health professionals can effectively use creativity to support care in hospitals, long-term care, and in communities. Through specialised programs and workshops, practitioners learn how to apply artistic interventions to support health outcomes and contribute to person-centred care.
Research
Arts in health researchers generate knowledge about the impact of art interventions on health and quality of life. Researchers might, for example, study the effects of creative movement on dementia patients, or changes in attitudes toward chronic pain before and after museum visits. These studies, conducted across disciplines like life sciences, social sciences, and humanities, inform professional practice, program strategies, training, and policy formulation.
Field building
The field of arts in health is fragmented in the Netherlands, at a time when the country most needs it to be cohesive. Arts in health education, practice, and research can be found all over the country, but there is no national policy and very little dependable funding to support it. Health institutions that want arts in health programs may not know how to begin, and funders in the healthcare and culture sectors may lack inter-sectoral strategies to collaborate. Now is the time for our stakeholders to work together and find a shared identity, to: establish common standards of practice; share up-to-date research; recruit national leaders with broad influence; encourage the grassroots movement; develop funding sources; and formulate public policy to make the field sustainable.
a cultural transition
Science suggests that the arts can help build community cohesion, which in turn supports healthy living. The arts are valuable in themselves, but they can also contribute to wellbeing. Valuing the arts as part of both culture and health will require policy makers to facilitate collaborations across the culture and health sectors. In our communities, the arts should be evaluated not only as cultural participation, but also as support for wellbeing.