Giving Compass' Take:
- Elizabeth Hewitt reports on how hospitals are investing in arts and culture offerings to bolster the physical and mental health of patients.
- How does the Global Arts in Medicine Fellowship help its participants build relationships across borders to access resources and boost support for the arts and health in their regions?
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When Jamie Schuler teaches her Friday dance classes, some of her students stay seated. They follow her movements, some using just their upper or lower limbs, others syncing their hands and feet to the beat, thanks to hospitals investing in the arts to enrich patients' physical and mental health and well-being. Occasionally, the choreography leads to impromptu singalongs — one class spontaneously began belting the chorus of Stevie Wonder’s “I Just Called to Say I Love You.”
At this particular class, held three days a week in Boulder, Colorado, most of the up to two dozen dancers have Parkinson’s disease or other conditions that impact their mobility. A mashup of physical therapy and artistic expression developed by New York’s Mark Morris Dance Group, Schuler’s classes are designed to help participants manage aspects of their diseases, like coordination, balance and gait, while declaring dance an art form for everyone. Some of the dancers have even joined 3rd Law, the company that puts on the classes, in live, on-stage professional performances.
“It’s joyful and fun,” says Schuler, regarding hospitals investing in the arts. “You don’t have to be a patient in this room. We are just moving together.”
Community-based workshops like this reflect a growing body of scholarship linking the arts to improved outcomes in physical and mental health. The research is fueling a push to make arts more accessible for everyone from childhood through adulthood, while hospitals, therapists and clinical researchers are increasingly bringing art and culture into environs for healing — often with remarkable results.
“We understand now, because of the epidemiological evidence that we have, that access to the arts is a determinant of health and well-being,” says Jill Sonke, a longtime arts and health researcher who is currently U.S. cultural policy fellow with Stanford University, regarding hospitals investing in the arts. “If we don’t make access to the arts more equitable, we’re doing harm.”
Momentum has been building around programs that connect arts and health for decades, but a recent spate of research has underscored just how intrinsically the two are linked. A 2019 World Health Organization report found that the arts help promote health in several ways, including by encouraging healthy behaviors, and supporting child development and caregiving. Meanwhile, artistic interventions can help people manage mental illness, neurological conditions and noncommunicable diseases, as well as support end-of-life care.
Read the full article about investing in the arts and health by Elizabeth Hewitt at Reasons to Be Cheerful.