Funded by Applied Industrial Systems
Supported by Cumberland Infirmary Healing Arts & Cumbria University
About Being is a project for people who have suffered a stroke and is a development of a 10 week programme of work I led on the neurology ward at Cumberland Infirmary as a part of Reaching Horizons. The initial phase was generously funded by AIS who had a colleague suffer a stroke www.applied.co.uk/news/
About Being starts in the hospital and then moves into the community. The aim of the work is to offer a space for people who have had a stroke to come together to explore, create, socialise and take part in exercise that can support their physiotherapy programmes. In all, it is a project where the participants take ownership of their recovery.
Accompanied by music, the sessions focus on the positive potential of how each person can move: tracing melody with fingers, improvising and creating, all supporting participants capacity to experience more.
MSc Occupational Therapy student, Emily Gill, from Cumbria University, researched the initial phase of the project, and dance, OT and physiotherapy students support the community sessions. Susie Wilson, OT MSc Programme lead at the University is undertaking a service evaluation of the hospital sessions which will lead to a larger research project.
I see About Being as a model of work for future dance and arts in health projects where through arts intervention a logical, accessible progression from hospital to the community is created. And the person is at the centre – not their medical issues.