Pediatric art therapy workshop

At the Policlinico San Donato, AICCA conducts a workshop for children and adolescents with congenital heart defects as a space to express their feelings concerning the pathology, and the surgery necessary, in order to counteract anxiety. Individual and group activities are carried out Monday through Thursday mornings and afternoons, involving collage, drawing from the heart, representing illness, playing with medical tools, rights of children patients, creative writing, clay, embroidery, chromotherapy, music, making puppets, photography and the personalization of individual medical records. The Association staff, thanks to individual interaction in the hospital, also guarantees art therapy activities for those children and youths who cannot leave their beds. The project is run by a professional team, including psychologists, psycho-therapists, peer counselors and an artist. The workshop is well known inside the ward, not only by the patients’ families, for whom it has become a precious moment during the day, but also by doctors who, when a child is hospitalized, inform both the patient and the parents about the workshop, often sending them there directly.