A 2013 DARE (Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects) review concluded that creative art therapies could reduce the symptoms of anxiety, depression and pain for patients with cancer after treatment but less so at follow-up. Not questioning about the review methods or conclusion, but curious about how those randomized controlled trials (RCTs) compared outcomes of creative art therapies with no treatment, which meant not participating in "art, dance, drama, music, writing, or a combination of these", broadly defined as creative arts. Those 1,576 patients from 27 trials were assessed before, during or after treatment, or both.
Questions then I want to ask:
- What makes an art a therapy?
- What are the significant features of creative art therapies that could possibly make any impact on neurobiological or psychological measures of cancer symptoms?
- How different are these therapies from drug or other types of treatments in improving the symptoms of "anxiety, depression or pain"?
An Art Therapy open house was held just outside the unit I work at yesterday, music and colors making this place less fluid. I see a spring day whenever I am around arts even in the piercing chill Calgary winter, green touches on the glass and flowers in bloom. Everyone says time changes everything, but the butterflies on the ceiling tiles at my front desk here have kept the fragrance of the days when patients painted them, floated away my grey doubts every time I look up. And, how can we measure my psychological outcomes of these?
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