Creatives in Place

Creatives in Place (CiP) is a new creative health model that aims to support the development of innovative ways of working in primary care, with a particular emphasis on inequalities. It expands upon the skill and mindsets typically available to primary care teams and their local communities. It pushes frontline collaborative, cross-sector and cross-disciplinary working into new areas of practice, to supplement the spectrum of approaches (medical, non-medical, social, creative) available for developing neighbourhood wellbeing in a responsive and nuanced way.

As a piece of action research, CiP aims to explore whether a creative, bridging role that helps position a GP practice as a central player in local community development, can bring mutually beneficial and meaningful wellbeing benefits to patients, community and the GP practice itself.

Arts Derbyshire are working in collaboration with two trailblazer GP practices – Hannage Brook Medical Centre in Wirksworth and Littlewick Medical Centre in Erewash – who are keen to be innovators and at the forefront of positive changemaking.

Our Creatives in Place – Bethany Sheldon (Erewash) and Nick Davis (Wirksworth) are skilled creatives, each with their own professional arts practice, but vitally they have creative mind and skills sets which will help bridge conversations, identify opportunities and gaps in provision to support community wellbeing which is informed by the communities / individuals themselves.

Our Creatives in Place will work with GPs, social prescribers, health visitors, clinicians and their local communities, creating a flow between them. They will act to generate beneficial connections, foster important conversations and develop meaningful projects/practices. They will be based within the GP practice team as well as out and about in the community.

The CiPs will work alongside local health practitioners to understand the challenges faced and to offer thoughts on how non-clinical, creative and social approaches might add value and contribute to health and wellbeing goals, including employee wellbeing.

They will be co-producers, with their finger on the pulse of the community, building connections and relationships from the bottom up in a way that reveals the wants, needs and motivations of that community. They will develop an understanding of local assets, identifying gaps and opportunities and how they could be built upon to support community social, emotional, cultural and physical wellbeing. This process would deploy creative thinking, skills, techniques and methodologies and create opportunities for individuals and the community to be seen and heard, to help develop a greater sense of agency through positive activity, and to explore how the nuance of social determinants at play are affecting lives, and wellbeing.

They will then use the intelligence and ideas gathered across all areas and work with health practitioners, social prescribers and other partners, and the community, to shape the range of services and activities developed with a view to ultimately alleviating time and capacity pressures faced by medical practitioners, whilst providing alternative, meaningful non-medical alternatives.

At Arts Derbyshire we are committed to social innovation which sits alongside medical provision. We are not seeking to replace or duplicate existing resources. However, the health and wellbeing needs of our communities have changed over the years, and have outgrown and overwhelmed what the NHS can offer. There has long been a widely acknowledged need to move towards greater prevention and a model in which the patient/public has greater agency over their own health.

Make sure you are signed up to Arts Derbyshire’s Newsletter for regular updates on this work and how it develops!

If you would like to know more, please contact Nicola Middler, Creative Health Producer nicola@artsderbyshire.org.uk