Abstract
This service development initiative took place at a large London hospital which has a small yet established art therapy service serving a large population of cancer patients. Nurses on the chemotherapy day unit approached our psychological services team (made up of Art Psychotherapists and Clinical Psychologists) to ask whether there was anything we could offer on the day ward, outside of the usual process of key clinicians referring individual patients to the team.
Ward staff recognised the experience of waiting for and receiving chemotherapy on the extremely busy day unit could be stressful for patients, some of whom made their frustration known. Ward staff often felt too under-resourced to provide extra support for these patients. We decided to run an evaluation study to ascertain whether offering single session art therapy on the day unit was an effective way of supporting day patients (and our nursing colleagues on the day unit). About halfway through the evaluation it was decided to extend the study to include patients receiving radiotherapy.
Ward staff recognised the experience of waiting for and receiving chemotherapy on the extremely busy day unit could be stressful for patients, some of whom made their frustration known. Ward staff often felt too under-resourced to provide extra support for these patients. We decided to run an evaluation study to ascertain whether offering single session art therapy on the day unit was an effective way of supporting day patients (and our nursing colleagues on the day unit). About halfway through the evaluation it was decided to extend the study to include patients receiving radiotherapy.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Specialist publication | Newsbriefing - Membership publication for the British Association of Art Therapists |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Nov 2019 |
Keywords
- single session art therapy
- art therapy
- chemotherapy
- radiotherapy
- oncology