Mapping of Initiatives on Culture, Health and Well-being

ENO Breathe is an award-winning breathing and well-being programme developed specifically for people recovering from COVID-19, who are still suffering from breathlessness and associated anxiety. Delivered by ENO in collaboration with Imperial College Healthcare teams entirely online, the programme focuses on breathing re-training through singing. The aim of ENO Breathe is to empower patients in the management of breathlessness and anxiety post COVID-19 infection, by equipping them with the tools they need for self-management.
ENO Breathe is not a choir or singing group. It is a social prescribing (non-clinical) intervention that uses singing techniques to aid recovery from COVID-19. No prior experience or interest in singing is required to take part in ENO Breathe. ENO Breathe offers participants:
- An initial one-to-one online conversation with ENO Breathe session leaders to discuss participants’ suitability for the programme, explain what the programme involves, and answer any questions you might have.
- Six weekly group online workshop sessions, led by a professional singer from the ENO encourage participants to take part in exercises and activities specifically designed to support breathing control, providing tools for self-management of breath and anxiety.
- Access to bespoke online digital resources, designed to support participants between sessions. These include exercises, song sheets and audio and video materials, especially recorded by the ENO for participants on the programme.
- Access to post-programme weekly drop-in sessions, if participants wish to revisit exercises and songs in a friendly and relaxed environment with other participants who have also completed the programme.
Lullabies will be used as a way into exercises throughout the six weeks on the programme. Lullabies are expressly designed to calm and soothe, and have the benefit of being short, memorable and accessible to all.
The programme is available in England.

Creative Exchanges is a seven week accredited training course for activities coordinators in care settings and people from an arts background with an interest in working with older people. It trains participants to plan and facilitate arts activities for older people.

A multi-arts project with young adults working to create a new well-being trail in Chopwell Wood. Consultation with members of the community took place through an open workshop in the wood. Following this, young adults took part in creative workshops with the artist, the writer and the animator to co-produce artwork for the trail. These workshops allowed re-connection with peers, and with the creative process itself. Artwork was spaced along the trail, while QR codes lead to digital animation, soundscape and spoken word that can be accessed while walking, running or riding. The trail was available for 12 months and visitors were invited to share their experiences of the trail via social media.

The purpose of the project Culture in Homecare is to investigate whether digital cultural access is important for well-being and health of the people who receive homecare.
In a collaborative approach between healthcare, academia and culture, digital cultural experiences (opera performances from The Metropolitan Opera) are made available to patients and relatives in home healthcare. The project also investigates how to inspire cultural content producers to include into their target groups the sick, elderly and relatives and to be able to meet a variety of personal interests in healthcare.

Culture-assisted rehabilitation is an initiative that facilitates the return to work after a sick leave, that can be experienced as a big challenge. Culture-supported rehabilitation has proven suitable at this stage, for those who are on sick leave for stress-related problems, mental illness and/or unspecified long-term pain. A culture-assisted rehabilitation lasts for ten weeks. The participants could try different forms of cultural activities, such as theater, crafts, movement, music and choir singing. The group also takes part in cultural experiences such as concerts, theater performances and art exhibitions. The participants meet twice a week with a reunion after completing rehabilitation.

In multi-week missions, professionally trained clown artists support children and their families living in crisis situations to develop strategies to cope with their challenging situation. These are people who have lost almost everything, who have witnessed and survived conflicts or natural disasters, who were forced to flee, and who live in dire and stressful situations.
With our artistic and interactive clown interventions, the children are given the possibility to express their feelings in a playful manner. The clowns can trigger a shift of focus, concentrating on the positive, the strength and the abilities of the children. The reconnection to positive feelings helps to regain resilience and hope.
The programme is implemented on a regular and on-going basis since 2013.

The demographic change in Europe is resulting in a growing population of 65+ and a growing need for arts projects that address the wellbeing of the elderly. Senior citizens, and their general well-being, constitute a group whose needs often go unmet. RED NOSES Clowns are engaging with senior citizens since more than 25 years. They are meeting them with respect and empathy, integrating their personal history and activating all their senses. That means singing songs together, recalling familiar smells, sharing recipes, connecting with memories from their “golden years” or dancing a gentle waltz.
When it comes to elderly people, RED NOSES senior programmes aim at contributing to the development of compassionate, respectful and person-centred care. RED NOSES International recognizes the need to provide the highest standards of healthcare and wellbeing at all ages. During the interactions, humour is used to convey respect for human dignity and for the personal history of the other. For elderly people, humour at their bedside conveys the message that they are acknowledged as valuable member of society that deserve to receive empathetic attention.
Besides regular visits, RED NOSES also developed Varieté - a theater workshop for seniors. Senior citizens in need of care often have the impression that they are no longer needed because they no longer have any tasks. The workshop shows how much the elderly participants have to offer. Here, residents of nursing homes study stage acts from the magical world of vaudeville alongside the clowns and playfully become stars. For three days, nursing home residents enter the magical world of vaudeville. On two mornings, the clowns sensitively support the senior citizens as they rehearse their stage numbers in the areas of dance, artistry, magic and curiosities. The program is designed in such a way that people with a wide range of physical and cognitive impairments can also participate. After two days of rehearsals, the curtain is raised in front of a selected audience (residents, relatives, nursing staff) - the senior citizens perform what they have learned in a show. The applause and their successful performance boost the residents' self-confidence and show them what forgotten skills they still have.

Creating We Make Health is an initiative that seeks to promote inclusion and access to creative practices oriented towards community health and well-being, developed by collectives, groups and individuals, who promote therapeutic processes, health promotion, socialization and participation of people in community life, through arts and crafts. A space for dialogue in health is proposed considering the experience of these collectives that connect performing arts, music, visual arts and collaborative entrepreneurship with the well-being of the target groups. It includes: meetings of health managers working through the arts and the creation of a network; exhibitors of informative stands in open spaces of the Faculty of Medicine; reflexive activities and exchange of methodologies.

La Colifata is an non-governmental organization that develops activities in the area of investigation and that offers mental health services utilizing the media to create “spaces of health”. The radio is commonly known as LT 22 Radio ¨La Colifata¨, the radio of the current and former internal patients of the Borda Hospital in Buenos Aires, Argentina. It is the first radio in the world to air from within a psychiatric hospital. The mentally ill patients broadcast through a radio station around the world from an Argentine mental asylum.

Compagnia di San Paolo (CSP), one of the largest foundations in Europe, initiated Dédalo Vola, a community project that promotes a healthy lifestyle through cross-sectoral collaborations. Dédalo Vola activates a network of subjects that contribute to the development of a cultural well-being environment that generates health at the community level;
offer, through adequate communication, activities that generate health to the adults, and to citizens less involved in these activities; transform the hospital into an environment that proposes art and culture in its prevention and treatment paths; evaluate the effects on well-being and perceived health of the proposed cultural activities.
The proposed interventions are oriented towards the following cultural activities: museum experiences, reading experiences, active theater experiences, active music experiences, transformation of treatment spaces.