Art cart makes healing rounds at St. Joseph Medical Center

TOWSON – One day before she was scheduled to have coronary bypass surgery at University of Maryland St. Joseph Medical Center after suffering a heart attack at 52, Danielle Giles focused her attention on painting a picture of a sandy beach.

Watching an instructional video that played in her hospital room in early August, the parishioner of Church of the Nativity in Timonium carefully applied bright colors to her paper canvas.

“It’s not very beautiful or anything,” Giles said with a laugh, “but just the act of touching the brush to paper is the relaxing part. It’s a good way to be distracted when you have heavy stuff going on.”

Beginning in Summer 2021, University of Maryland St. Joseph Medical Center, Towson, has offered patients such as Giles the chance to relax and express themselves creatively through the hospital’s “Heart Cart” outreach. Volunteers roll the “Heart Cart” filled with art supplies from room to room and invite patients to create a variety of images with the help of a step-by-step video instruction session.

The program is not art therapy, but a means of helping patients cope as they face life-changing health challenges.

“It really does give them a reprieve from all the stress and anxiety and the unknown they are facing, said Victoria Chahanovich, patient experience program manager at the hospital. “It also allows another kind of personal connection between the staff and patient to kind of deepen that trust and that connection.”
Patients have the option of keeping their art or donating to the program to help inspire other patient artists.

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