Over the past year, our people volunteered alongside our charity partner, Birmingham Children’s Hospital (BCH), supporting the ArtKart, a mobile trolley of arts and crafts materials that visits wards across BCH, offering both bedside and take-away creative activities for young patients.
Through these sessions, we spent time with children and their families, colouring, drawing and getting creative together. These moments, while simple, provided welcome breaks from clinical routines, helping to bring comfort, connection and positivity during what can be an unsettling and challenging hospital stay.
ArtKart sits within the hospital’s broader EnjoyArt programme, funded by Birmingham Women’s and Children’s Hospital Charity, which uses the arts to enhance the hospital environment and improve experiences for patients, families and staff. Research shows that creative activity can play an important role in healthcare settings, helping reduce stress and anxiety, providing distraction during treatment, and creating warmer, more welcoming spaces that feel less clinical. Art can also reflect the diversity of the community it serves, supporting inclusion and emotional wellbeing.
For staff, enhanced environments can also improve morale and job satisfaction, with positive knock-on effects for patient care. For children, taking part in creative activities can support mental and emotional healing, offering moments of normality, self-expression and joy at a time when they are most needed.
By giving time and creativity, this partnership shows how small acts of care can make a meaningful difference, strengthening the human side of healthcare and supporting wellbeing for patients, families and staff alike.
