Therapy garden will enhance care of stroke patients
BBCA special therapy garden is being built at a hospital to enhance the care of stroke patients.
The previously unused space at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH) in King's Lynn, Norfolk, is undergoing a £50,000 transformation to provide outdoor physiotherapy sessions.
Research shows that regular access to outdoor spaces promotes recovery and reduces the isolation facing hospital patients.
Stroke survivor and volunteer Al Ware, 84, said: "If you can walk out here and show them something nice, have a nice little chat out here rather than in the ward, I think it will make a huge difference."
Sessions will include activities like gardening and mini-golf, used as a way to encourage patients to keep up with their treatment.
The "Garden for Recovery" will be finished in May.
Mr Ware, from Dersingham, is a volunteer on the hospital's West Raynham ward.
He said having a stroke was a scary experience, and seeing someone who has recovered was reassuring for patients.
"Being in hospital, in a ward all the time, it takes it out of people really," he said.
"So if you can walk out here and show them something nice, have a nice little chat out here rather than in the ward, I think it will make a huge difference".
The garden was the brainchild of therapy assistants Amelia Turner, Cara Holt and Sarah Barber.
Ms Turner said that research has shown patients with access to outdoor space had better recoveries.
"The garden will be somewhere where they can come and escape the clinical environment, have a bit of quiet time with their family and space to get back to doing the things they loved doing before their stroke," she said.
Ms Barber said she was looking forward to working with patients in the new space.
She said: "I think it will give us so many more options for patients to do their therapy, help them to engage more and give them the chance to do other things."
The garden has been paid for by the QEH charity, and an appeal is ongoing to buy equipment for patients to use, like gardening tools and mini-golf putters.
The hospital is due to be rebuilt in the coming years but investment like this on the current site continues.
Transformation manager Sophie Button said the design of the garden was tailored to the needs of patients.
"There's a mini golf section, there will be items on the walls to help with scanning and visual aids," she said.
"The decking will have different textures on it as you walk around as well as lots of places to sit, and an eight seater table to allow patients to have therapy sessions together."
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