New volunteering programme in Hospital de la Santa Creu i Sant Pau

26/03/2019

The new volunteering in Sant Pau will look after up to 36 patients from the geriatric floor and will consist of a space of collective entertainment through board games, cognitive stimulation with puzzles, letter soups, memory games, crafts and relaxation tasks such as painting mandalas. These activities are approached in two perspectives: firstly, taking the illness to the background and, secondly, offering a space of accompanying people that often feel alone during the process of convalescence.

This volunteering is carried out with the supervision of responsible and professional workers from the hospital. The first contact with volunteers was between Alba Villalobos, responsible for geriatric nursing, and Andrés Aristayeta, a responsible member for the volunteering. The volunteering is “an added value to the hospital’s medical team” for Alba and Andrés, for which they often receive thank-you letters. They also stated that volunteer accompanying is an “interesting field to investigate the effects of illnesses and their results” which, despite being hard to measure, are “very visual”.

In the future there will also be the option to do individual accompanying under the demands of patients and the nursing team. Alba and Andrés said that “someone with Alzheimer is not aware that he is explaining the same thing 50 times, but he is aware that he is being listened to”.

There are now three different hospitals where the FAS’ socio-sanitary programme has volunteers in: Hospital de la Vall d’Hebron, Centre Fòrum de l’Hospital del Mar and Hospital de Santa Creu i Santa Pau. Social action in these hospitals allows promoting socially positive attitudes and values such as solidarity and empathy and raise awareness on difficulties experienced during hospitalization, leaving clichés out. Right now, 32 volunteers make the FAS socio-sanitary programme possible.

If you want to know more about the socio-sanitary programme, click here.