Doctors prescribe ‘free’ solution to aid mental health

Doctors in Switzerland are writing a new kind of prescription – and it won’t cost patients a thing. In Neuchâtel, a city in western Switzerland, physicians are now prescribing free visits to museums, art galleries, and public gardens to help people struggling with mental health issues and chronic illnesses.

How museums help fight mental health

So far, 500 of these “cultural prescriptions” are being handed out as part of a year-long pilot project. Patients can visit four sites, including the city’s botanical garden and three museums – one of which houses works by Monet and Degas. The idea: to give patients a moment of relief from pain, anxiety, and stress, and to spark emotional well-being in ways medicine alone sometimes can’t.

“For people who have difficulties with their mental health, it allows them for a moment to forget their worries, their pain, their illnesses,” said Dr. Patricia Lehmann, one of the participating doctors, speaking to Reuters. “I’m convinced that when we take care of people’s emotions, we allow them somehow to perhaps find a path to healing.”

As per the outlet, the program was inspired by a 2019 World Health Organization study on the role of the arts in health. But it also reflects lessons from covid-19 lockdowns, when closed museums left many people feeling even more isolated. “That was a real trigger,” said Julie Courcier Delafontaine, head of the city’s culture department. “We were really convinced that culture was essential for the well-being of humanity.”

If successful, the city hopes to expand the program to include theater and, one day, make cultural therapy something health insurance could cover. For now, patients are taking their “prescriptions” straight to the museum – and some say it helps. One 26-year-old woman, battling burnout, described her visit as “a little light in the darkness.”

In a healthcare system often focused on pills and procedures, Neuchâtel is betting that a dose of art or nature might be just what the doctor ordered.

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