Page 41 - Sweet Harmonies

Artlink are working with the Scottish Book Trust and the Reading Agency, who are supporting this new scheme with books and materials for the wards as well as additional support for volunteers.
The New Year saw the Reading Friends project
become a staple part of the hospital week. Our
new volunteer co-ordinator Simon Jay has taken
up the reins and has been doing a wonderful job
bringing it all together. He's met with our brilliant volunteers and gone with them onto wards to meet patients, sit and chat and read with them, in order to get to know them better and share stories.
Our volunteers bring their unique personalities to the role, tailoring stories and chit chat to the needs of different patients, whether it be sitting with a bed-bound resident at Prospect Bank to show photographs of Sea eld's historical past, or a passionate recital of Rabbie Burns' love poetry for Valentine's Day in the Day Room at Western General. The daughter of one patient told us with delight how her mother's memories of the War had been triggered by a volunteer's story.
These unique interactions that come from volunteers regularly visiting wards can have such a transformative effect for staff, patients and visitors alike. An hour here and there, having a blether with a patient may not seem much, but we've already witnessed the positive effect it's having on those we've visited.
We've had regular visits to St. John's, Western General and Prospect Bank over the last few months, and the feedback has been very positive, not only from staff and patients, but also from volunteers, who have said how they’ve found the experience fun, humbling and very rewarding.
If you're interested in joining our volunteers, why not come and volunteer for the Reading Friends Scheme? Contact Simon Jay, Reading Friends Volunteer Co-ordinator
(Monday and Thursdays) for more information.
simon@artlinkedinburgh.co.uk
Sweet Harmonies 41
© Simon Jay
Volunteering