Cultural Diversity: Arts to Preserve Brain Health - From Despair to Desire

Dr Sharmi Bhattacharyya, Consultant & Clinical Lead for Older People's Mental Health at Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board in North Wales and Editor of The Old Age Psychiatrist at the Royal College of Psychiatrists, chairs a debate between leaders in social prescribing, culture health and wellbeing, with a particular focus on diagnostic tools and arts workshops celebrating diverse cultures.

The idea of our free monthly Arts for Brain Health webinars - in association with Sir Muir Gray, Director of the Optimal Ageing Programme at the University of Oxford - is to help advance social prescribing practice and clarify cross sector communications to empower people to preserve their brain health, interests and sense of belonging in the otherwise fear-filled isolating months/years leading to diagnosis of a potential dementia.

On 5 July, academics and specialist practitioners present a vivid range of culturally diverse arts opportunities, raising awareness from participant to cultural programmes .

Who for?

If your work involves arts for health or creative ageing, social prescribing, dementia prevention or wish to extend your programmes for early-stage dementia to people at the very onset - keen to preserve their cultural interests - or are already running such programmes for individuals and family partners and wish to know more about the social prescribing referral route to literary opportinutes, this webinar shares insights, progress and learning from experts in healthy ageing, scholars, poets, creative writers and regional leads in Culture Health and Wellbeing and Social Prescribing.

Our Arts for Brain Health Webinar partner and driver of actions ongoing is Sir Muir Gray. The author of Increase your Brainability and Reduce your Risk of Dementia and Director of the Optimal Ageing Programme at The University of Oxford.

AGENDA

10 pm Veronica Franklin Gould FRSA, AMRSPH, author of A.R.T.S. for Brain Health: Social Prescribing transforming the diagnostic narrative for dementia - from Despair to Desire (2021, Arts 4 Dementia), introduces:

10. 05 CHAIR: Dr Sharmi Bhattacharyya, Consultant & Clinical Lead for Older People's Mental Health at Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board in North Wales and Editor of The Old Age Psychiatrist at the Royal College of Psychiatrists

10.10 Dr Karan Jutlla, Senior Lecturer in Health (Dementia Lead) Institute of Health, University of Wolverhampton, presents ethnically diverse diagnostic tools.

10.15 Dr Sonu Bhaskar, Director, Global Health Neurology Lab, Sydney, Australia.

10.20 Thanh Sinden, Culture Health and Wellbeing Alliance.

10.25 Arti Prashar OBE, artist and drama practitioner: ‘Visionaries: A South Asian Arts and Ageing Counter Narrative‘

10.30 Kadria Thomas, English/Yemeni Gospel choir leader.

10.35 Bisakha Sarker MBE, Founder and Artistic Director, Chaturangan South Asian dance

10.40 Dr Mercy Wanduara, Department of Fashion Design and Marketing, Kenyatta University, Nairobi presents Kenyan basketry by women from Central and Eastern Kenya.

10.45 Majgkaja Arts Resource Agency Aboriginal Arts Centres Keeping our Elders Strong, IIkuntji artists.

10.50 Maki Sekiya, Japanese pianist, musician in residence at Green Templeton College, Oxford

10.55 Margaret Morris, Hackney Caribbean Elders arts afternoons

11 am Rushna Miah, chair, Herts Asian Women's Association, providing a social prescribing service.

11.05 SPEAKER DEBATE

11.25 Chair's Summary

11.30 Close

SPEAKER BIOGRAPHIES

VERONICA FRANKLIN GOULD FRSA AMRSPH founded Arts 4 Dementia in 2011 to develop weekly programmes for early-stage dementia at arts venues, training, best practice conferences and reports, with a website to coordinate arts opportunities for dementia in the community. Her inaugural programme, Reawakening the Mind (2012-13), won the London 2012 Inspire Mark and Positive Breakthrough in Mental Health Dementia Award 2013. Veronica was named finalist in The Sunday Times Changemaker competition and on publication of Music Reawakening (2015), she was appointed A4D president. Her regional guide, Reawakening Integrated: Arts & Heritage (2017), maps arts opportunities for dementia and aligns arts within NHS England’s Well Pathway for Dementia. Veronica’s social prescribing programme (2019-21) opened with a conference Towards Social Prescribing (Arts & Heritage) for the Dementias (May 2019, Wellcome Collection). To address cross-sector issues raised, she piloted dance and drama social prescribing programmes to test the process and ran a series of 15 cross-sector conferences around the UK. Findings were disseminated in a two-day conference and report ‘Arts for Brain Health: Social Prescribing as Peri-Diagnostic Practice for Dementia' (2021).

PROFESSOR SHARMI BHATTACHARYYA is a Consultant in Old Age Psychiatry working in Wrexham, North Wales. A consultant since 2007 she has other academic and management roles: Visiting Professor at the University of Chester, Lead Editor for the Faculty of Old Age Psychiatry newsletter, Medical Member for Mental Health Tribunals, Clinical Lead for Older People’s Mental Health Services in North Wales. However, her interest and passion lie in working with older people with mental health problems. She is involved in research, teaching and has publications and presentations in areas such as dementias, mental health in ethnic communities, and dementias in younger people.

DR KARAN JUTLLA is a passionate researcher and educator dedicated to promoting cultural inclusivity in dementia care. As an academic, Karan’s research interests in the challenge of dementia care, particularly within South Asian communities have spanned over a decade. She continues to support policy makers, and health and social care service providers to potentially address and deliver superb outcomes for a hitherto neglected but growing part of the community. Karan has a ‘grass roots’ approach, and is passionate about ensuring that leadership level decisions are reflected in the quality of care received by service users. For more information about Karan, and her work, visit www.drjutlla.com.

DR SONU M.M. BHASKAR , MD Ph.D. PD (Stroke/Neurology, Director of the Global Health Neurology Lab, Sydney in Australia. is an award-winning physician-scientist, healthcare executive, board director, and academic neurologist with a specialization in vascular neurology & neuroradiology. Dr. Bhaskar leads national, international, and intersectoral programs, in global health and health systems, on reducing social inequalities in health with a focus on vulnerable populations and under-resourced settings. His pioneering research, leadership, and community engagement have had a local and global impact attracting numerous prestigious awards in Australia and overseas including the 2019 European Academy of Neurology Investigator Award, 2020 Rotary Vocational Excellence Award, 2021 Paul Harris Fellow recognition by Rotary International, and the Australian Government's Distinguished Global Talent Immigration (GTI) Award in 2021-22.

THANH SINDEN is a board director of the Culture Health and Wellbeing Alliance. An experienced Cultural professional with a demonstrated history of working in museums, arts and heritage organisations, Thanh is passionate about making a difference and curious with the intersection between culture heritage and social impact. She supports teams and organisations to make bold cultural changes that bring better equity, diversity and inclusion to businesses. She has worked with the Museum Association, Tate, What Next? Movement, the British Council, Culture Coventry, the Arts and Social Care Project at Wolverhampton and a range of community organisations and activist networks to foster the right conditions where inclusion and collaboration are embedded in teams. She is a former chair of the executive committee of Museum Detox, a UK network that champions fair representation and inclusion of ethnically diverse cultural, intellectual and creative contributions; and until recently was Interim Executive Director of the Centre for Chinese Contemporary Art.

MAKI SEKIYA , a Japanese concert pianist of world renown, has been musician in-residence at Green Templeton College, Oxford since 2017. Maki first performed Samei Satoh’s “Mirrors in the Dream” at her Wigmore Hall debut in spring 2022. As well as performing, Maki is interested in the holistic, therapeutic)role of music. As a music educator, she has formed a local music community Oxford Music Hub to connect like minded intergenerational musicians. She is a graduate of Moscow Conservatoire and lives in Oxford with her musical family. She recorded piano recitals to be shown at the Human Welfare Conference 2021, as in conversation with Emeritus Fellow Sir Muir Gray about ageing, music and wellbeing – music to elevate the mind. Maki will introduce the Green Chorus, the North London Japanese female choir for which her mother is the pianist.

ARTI PRASHAR OBE is at the forefront of immersive sensory theatre practice for people living with dementia and learning disabled people. She has a strong commitment to collaborative arts with values based on human rights. She stepped down as Spare Tyre's Artistic Director/CEO in August 2019 after inspirational and acclaimed leadership for 19 years. Research with Elizabeth Lynch MBE: Visionaries: a South Asian Arts and Ageing Counter Narrative for CADA and Art and Dementia in the UK South Asian Diaspora for Baring Foundation Arti was acknowledged in the Queen’s New Year list 2022 with an OBE; she received a Tonic Award 2020 (inclusion and diversity) and is a Winston Churchill Fellow 2013 (spirituality, dementia and ageing). A director and, consultant, Arti is Research Fellow at the Centre of Contemporary Theatre at Birkbeck University.

KADRIA THOMAS has been choir director for the Accord Inspirational Gospel Choir since 2000, then the Pennine Care Trust in 2012 based in Ashton in Greater Manchester, the latter specifically formed for individuals who have mental health challenges or who work with and support those with mental health. In 2016 Kadria was invited to direct a choir that supports people with dementia, their care providers, support staff and volunteers. Over the last 15 years Kadria has used her experience and skills to deliver numerous health and wellbeing workshops to people of all ages and from diverse cultural backgrounds using her singing expertise and as a motivational speaker. Her invitation in 2002 to speak and deliver a presentation at a conference for 200 women entitled ‘Healing in the Music’ was the first of many, since then Kadria has been invited into prisons, community initiative events such as ‘Mothers Against Guns’, ‘Every Child Matters’ to deliver tailor-made workshops and seminars.

BISAKHA SARKER MBE is a dance artist and the artistic director of Chaturangan, an arts organisation engaged in a diverse range of creative activities to raise the profile of South Asian dance for health and wellbeing. She is a performer, producer, choreographer, researcher, educationalist and writer. Bisakha has extensive experience of working with South Asian dance and art in different health settings e.g. hospitals, care homes and community projects. Her company, in partnership with other universities and art centres, has organised a number of landmark national and international dance conferences on topics like ‘Dance and Ageing’ and ‘Dance and Dementia’ establishing a new style of artist-led conference programming. Bisakha, a Churchill Fellow, is featured in The Artist in Time. (2020, Baring Foundation).

DR MERCY WANDUARA, Lecturer & Chairperson Fashion Design and Marketing at Kenyatta Univ ersity, Nairobi, has a training and career background in clothing, textiles and education. She holds a PhD in Fashion Merchandising, an MSc in Textile Materials and Bachelor of Education (B.Ed.) degree in Home Economics. Mercy has a work experience of over 25 years at various levels of the Kenyan educational system. Apart from teaching, Mercy has held various administrative positions in the Kenyan education sector. Among other activities, she has been involved in both local and international collaborations where she has held talks and demonstrations on her research work. Her interests centre on textile crafts, indigenous textiles and micro and small businesses.

MARGARET MORRIS, a Caribbean artist, has been working with the Hackney Caribbean Elderly Organisation, delivering a range of Arts for Elderly Engagement for sixteen years. She works with wood, glass-painting, needlework, gardening, music and dance. She is currently preparing a book with the group, looking at healing herbs they used in the Caribbean when they were young and continue to use in the present day. The Hackney Caribbean Elders are also doing a project on Afro-Caribbean music and dance. Every year the group exhibits at the Hackney Museum.

RUSHNA MIAH is Chair of Hertfordshire Asian Women’s Association (HAWA), a voluntary association which runs events, workshops and projects for women from all racial and cultural background. These range from HAWA'a Saheli Tiffin Club, Habiba Garden, BAME Social prescribing, Kick Boxing as well as visits and trips organised to eradicate loneliness and isolation amongst the culturally diverse communities. Rushna's current role as a Covid Recovery Ethnic Diverse Officer is about tackling health inequalities amongst the ethnically diverse communities. Rushna is a trained Life Coach and a qualified Sylheti interpreter. In addition, I can speak Hindi, Urdu and little bit of Arabic.