Arts & Health Education to Improve Health, Resilience, and Well-Being

Within the healthcare field today there is an increased concern with public health, population health, wellness, and prevention, all of which include focusing on physical health, obesity, chronic health conditions, unhealthy lifestyles, aging, and mental health issues. As healthcare professionals attempt to improve individuals' health outcomes, quality of life, well-being, coping skills, and health indicators, they also must try to promote behavior change that helps keep patients out of the hospital. These are concerns faced by individuals of all ages, genders, ethnicities, cultural backgrounds, socioeconomic statuses, and diagnoses. Therefore, it is important to find multiple means of addressing these concerns with the various populations as it is likely that no one particular method would be effective for every individual. Programs and interventions have been created to address health, resilience, and well-being at the individual and the social level. They demonstrate the importance of providing support, encouraging behavior changes, and reinforcing objectives determined by the healthcare system. Many of these programs have focused on improving resilience and increasing participants' ability to thrive or recover from the illnesses and challenges they face. The broad problem to be addressed by this study is to assess if arts-based programs are superior to non-arts-based health education programs at improving individuals' physical and mental health outcomes, quality of life, well-being, resilience, coping skills, stress, and health indicators while promoting behavior change and keeping them out of the hospital. Previous programs have focused on improving resilience. Individual arts interventions such as music, art, craft, choir singing, writing, theater, and movement have been utilized and in many cases found to be helpful in addressing resilience, coping, health, and well-being; however, it is not known what effect a program utilizing multiple arts-based interventions would have on adults with chronic health conditions. The primary benefit of conducting research into the effectiveness of different arts-based programs is the identification of the specific benefits of programs aimed at influencing health, resilience, and well-being in individuals with a variety of chronic health conditions. The purpose of this randomized controlled study is to determine the outcomes of an 8-week arts-based program on the health, resilience, and well-being of individuals with chronic health conditions in an outpatient underserved community setting as compared to outcomes from individuals participating in a separate 8-week-non-arts-based health education program in the same setting. The purpose of including a variety of arts experiences is so that individuals will hopefully find at least one art form to which they can relate and will utilize in their lives to assist with their health, resilience, and well-being. The non-arts-based program will include educational topics related to health, resilience, and well-being.