Positive approach to the healing process
By offering tools other than verbal to communicate suffering and isolation, art therapy facilitates the often difficult exchange for families touched by illness and acts positively on children hospitalized or experiencing distress.
Children followed in art therapy may perceive physical intervention or hospitalization in a negative way, thus developing the need to externalize this difficult experience. By working on imagery, metaphor, symbol and sensory construction, the young patient's resources and abilities to deal with the symptom are activated, with positive repercussions on the healing process.
The art therapy model chosen by the Lugano Regional Hospital is characterized by the fact that the art therapist works as part of a multidisciplinary team, consisting of physicians, psychologists, occupational therapists, nurses and a psychiatrist who provides supervision.
