The Healing Power of Art: Can Hospital Collections Help?

Most of us agree that hospitals are inherently stressful and it's pretty bleak to stare at a blank wall or wait for a doctor in a cramped, dark room. Sick or not, we'd prefer a sunny view or a Monet watercolor. Yet in an era of escalating healthcare costs, it's important to justify spending on aesthetics and design.

Can an attractive drawing or photograph reduce pain or anxiety? Do patients with art in their environment heal faster?

More and more hospitals think so. And they're putting big money behind it, transforming what were once cold, sterile spaces into mini-museums and contemporary art destinations, complete with audio guides and video installations.

More than 40 percent of health care facilities in 2007 had arts programs, including musical performances, healing gardens and art classes, according to a 2009 report from Arts & Health Alliance, a Washington, D.C., nonprofit. And permanent, public art displays — such as paintings and murals — were the most prevalent. Hospital art has only grown in the last five years, said Leslie Faerstein, executive director of Arts & Health Alliance. She anticipates that the organization's 2015 study will find a significant increase in the number of health care facilities with art programs.

Illustrating this trend, Arts & Health Alliance did a survey of 129 Veterans medical centers in 2013, Faerstein said. More than half of them offered arts programming at patients' bedside and more than 40 percent have rotating art exhibitions, permanent art collections, commissioned paintings or sculptures.

Our innate preference for a soothing painting or sunny park over a dark alley has a scientific basis. A 2011 University of London study found that blood flow increased 10 percent to the "joy response" part of the brain when subjects saw a beautiful painting — just like when you look at a loved one. The findings give credence to what we've always suspected, Faerstein said: that visual art has a strong, positive physiological effect on the brain.

In a hospital setting, Roger Ulrich's landmark 1984 research revealed that the view from a surgery patient's window influences recovery. Those who saw trees recuperated almost a full day faster and required fewer doses of pain medication than those facing a brick wall.

Building on this premise, the Cleveland Clinic recently found that more than 60 percent of patients reported a reduction in stress from the hospital's contemporary art collection — works produced in the last 30 years, including fine art posters in exam rooms, public sculptures, nature images and abstract designs.

"Art in hospitals does so many different things for different people," said Joanne Cohen, executive and curator of the art program at Cleveland Clinic's Arts & Medicine Institute. "Because of the diversity, over 5,400 objects, 20 site-specific installations, spread out over 23 million square feet of facilities, we are far more diverse than most hospital collections."

For some patients and visitors, the pieces create a natural focal point and an incentive to walk down the hall. For others, it's an opportunity to peacefully reflect or learn from the explanatory labels, and distract themselves from their surroundings, she said.

For every day a patient lies in a hospital bed, it takes roughly three days to achieve his or her previous level of functioning, according to Dr. Lisa Harris, an internist and chief executive of Eskenazi Health, affiliated with the Indiana University School of Medicine.

"If an art installation gets a patient out of his room or paintings take a person's mind off their pain and lower their stress levels, the art isn't just decorative anymore. It's part of the entire model of care," said Harris, who oversees a $1.5 million art program, funded entirely by philanthropic donors, that launched last December.

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