Music in Hospitals to support our young patients at Ty Llidiard

Well done to our arts and health coordinator Esyllt George who took part in a panel discussion, as part of the Music in Hospitals and Care 75th Anniversary celebration at the Pierhead Building in Cardiff.  Esyllt talked about the benefits of live music for health and wellbeing, and partnership working to support the wellbeing of our young patients at the Ty Llidiard unit in Bridgend.

‘Music for Mental Health and Wellbeing’ is a 12-month project with the charity Music in Hospitals and Care, funded by the Peter Sowerby Foundation. The project is providing live music sessions at six mental health settings across the UK, with Ty Llidiard being the only child and adolescent mental health unit involved in the project.

The aim of the project is to try out different approaches to live music delivery, to see what works well, and how the sessions could be adapted to increase the impact and benefits of live music in mental health settings.

The project started in April 2022 and Music in Hospitals and Care has worked with Esyllt George, Arts in Health Coordinator, and the staff team at Ty Llidiard to understand the needs of the young people, identify the right musicians for the project and trying out different ways of providing the live music. Musicians involved in the project include a Celtic harpist, a singer guitarist, brass trio, and a violin and harp duo.

Since September, 12 pilot live music sessions have been provided for the young people at Ty Llidiard. Learning from the pilot sessions helped the project team to agree the format of the sessions for the remaining six months, with a fortnightly ‘chill’ session in the multi-sensory room and a weekly ‘upbeat’ session in the lounge, felt to be most beneficial.

Lloyd Griffiths, Head of Nursing for Child Adolescent Mental Health Services said: “Music in Hospitals and Care, supported by Ty Llidiard’s Music Therapist, Paul Morgans Evans have been a great addition to our programme of therapeutic activities. Our young people and staff have really enjoyed the musicians and experiencing live music in ways that they wouldn’t normally engage with, some highlights have been brass versions of Disney classics and a Harry Styles song played on a violin and harp. We very much hope we continue our relationship with Music and Hospitals and Care going forward”.

Music in Hospitals and Care is now providing another 20 live music sessions, which will be part of the project evaluation, with an independent evaluator collecting qualitative feedback from staff, patients and musicians after every session. The project is due to be completed by June 2023.

10/05/2023