Pain management
with art can see a reduction in anxiety – caring for those who are sick and in pain can be intensely stressful and emotionally charged, especially with chronic pain patients who will always live with their condition. The positive effects experienced by staff
move beyond the physical, however. By interacting with patients in an art setting, staff can directly see the impact patients get from joining in, which is incredibly rewarding. Furthermore, involving staff and patients together fosters a shared experience. As humans, we’re social beings. For most, we look for opportunities to engage with other people and share stories and experiences. While this is harder for those that struggle in social situations, at the root of it, it all comes down to the need for a shared sense of belonging. And the collaborative nature of art workshops means they are a great way to do this.
The impact on the individual Beyond helping patients manage their pain better, art can have wider benefits. We saw this first hand during the Art for Health workshops run by the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital and funded by the Royal Orthopaedic Charity. Many of our patients have restricted movement due to their conditions, and some are house bound. These workshops provide patients with the opportunity to engage in creative activities that help them recover faster, manage their long- term conditions and experience a better quality of life. Patients explained that they could forget their pain during the sessions, but more than
Patients from the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital experience an afternoon of still life painting during an Art for Health workshop
this, they spoke of how much their confidence improved and that they felt they were able to make social connections with those in the same group where they struggled to elsewhere. As the sessions are run specifically for chronic pain patients, while each may have a different diagnosis, participants are all going through the challenge of dealing with a long-term condition, and by working in a group they were able to connect through their shared journeys. Patients who participate in these types of sessions have shown up to an increase of 3 points up the Warwick Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale (WEMWBS), which looks at psychological
functioning and subjective wellbeing.7
The positive impact on healthcare Beyond the patient themselves, the potential impacts that can be realised by implementing art into holistic pain management includes a reduction in GP visits and decrease in requirements for drug therapy. A meaningful improvement in general well-being can be measured using scores such as WEMWBS. Not only is this a great outcome for patients, equally it benefits the wider healthcare system. Artlift, which runs Arts on Prescription programmes for people living with mental health, chronic pain and associated challenges, carried out a cost benefit analysis from 2009 to 2012 on the financial impact of art therapy. Their study showed that after six months of working with an artist, people had 37 percent less demand for GP appointments and their need for hospital admissions dropped by 27 percent.8
From pottery to singing and painting, patients are able to express themselves creatively and forget their pain during these workshops
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www.clinicalservicesjournal.com I February 2024
Where do we go from here? In chronic pain management, we look for ways to help patients manage their long-term conditions in a positive way. While further funding is required to deliver programmes effectively, healthcare organisations should promote art as a key therapy for long term conditions, be they dementia, respiratory conditions, fibromyalgia or arthritis. The art workshops that we ran provided patients the opportunity to engage in creative activities that have helped them in their recovery. Not only did the workshops give them the knowledge that art supports their pain management needs, they also gave them the confidence to seek out additional art workshops in their local communities. It’s this connection between art
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