Health care takes on a cultural role

As part of their commitment to supporting and promoting the City of Culture 2013 over 60 staff from the Public Health Agency (PHA), Health and Social Care Board and the Western Health and Social Care Trust (Western Trust) recently completed the WorldHost Ambassador training programme, with the aim of becoming cultural champions and volunteers during 2013.

WorldHost is a world-class customer service training programme that has already been used to train nearly one million people worldwide, including front-line staff in hospitality, tourism and passenger transport for sporting and cultural events across the UK.  The 60 health and social care staff will join the 1,502 who have already been trained in the North West and over 4,300 across Northern Ireland.

The initiative for health and social care staff was funded by the PHA under its City of Culture project ‘Extraordinary People’.  The aim of the initiative was to up-skill health and social care staff in such a manner that would demonstrate commitment to the City of Culture 2013, but also to consider how the skills learnt in the training could be transferred to supporting patient and client care within the health service.

Brendan Bonner, Head of Health and Social Wellbeing, PHA said: “There is a growing body of evidence of how culture, art and recreation can be used for regeneration, promoting positive health and supporting recovery and we in health and social care want to use 2013 as a platform for utilising cultural activities to promote change and leave a lasting legacy for the city and region.” 

In relation to the World Host training, Brendan said: “Health and Social Care bodies are the biggest employers in the region and we are well placed to promote the 2013 programme and more importantly encourage staff to become actively involved in the volunteer and support programmes, as well as championing the initiative with staff, patients and carers.”

Speaking on behalf of the Western Trust, their Chief Executive Elaine Way said: “The WorldHost training is just one element of an exciting range of initiatives that the Trust is actively engaged in as part of our commitment to City of Culture. This will be an extraordinary year for the city and it is critical that all citizens have the opportunity to contribute to and engage in the range of activities that will be available and we are well placed with the range of service users we engage with on a daily basis to promote the cultural theme.

“The Trust is looking at how we can promote volunteering within staff as well as looking at how our facilitates and premises can be used to promote culture and art during the coming year and I will be encouraging our staff to get actively involved in the various initiatives and events and learn from the experience so that we can carry the legacy forward to the future ensuring that the Trust plays its part in ensuring Derry/ Londonderry does become ‘legenderry’.