Arts in health—sometimes called arts in medicine or arts in healthcare—is a diverse, multidisciplinary field dedicated to enhancing health and the healthcare experience through creative expression. It integrates literary, performing, and visual arts, design, and other forms of creativity into healthcare and community settings to improve health and well-being.

Research shows the arts help treat Alzheimer’s, substance use disorders, chronic pain, and depression, while reducing isolation and loneliness. For example, a recent eClinicalMedicine study found that social isolation and loneliness significantly increase risks for type 2 diabetes, dementia, heart disease, stroke, and premature death—risks comparable to smoking, obesity, and physical inactivity. The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine have similarly highlighted the profound health risks of social isolation, an issue particularly relevant in Maine, which has the nation’s oldest population and significant rural access challenges.

“The arts play a vital role in addressing challenges by fostering community connection, promoting healthy lifestyle habits, reducing stress, and building resilience,” said Maine Arts Commission Executive Director Amy Hausmann. “Creativity is essential to health—it serves as a bridge connecting generations, communities, and regions. By partnering with community wellness organizations, libraries, YMCAs, recreation programs, retirement communities, funders, schools, and state agencies, we can weave creative activities into daily life, strengthening well-being across the state.”

• Arts in Health Roundtables
  In collaboration with the Cultural Alliance of Maine, United Way of Southern Maine, Side x Side, MaineHealth, and community organizer Jessie Laurita-Spanglet, these sessions bring together Maine artists, arts organizations, and community partners who are engaged—or interested in becoming engaged—in the growing field of arts in health. Designed as regenerative spaces, the roundtables will provide opportunities to network, share resources, and foster partnerships, with the goal of identifying what is needed most to strengthen arts in health initiatives statewide.
• Creative Aging
  In 2024, the Maine Arts Commission began a partnership with the Maine Council on Aging (MCOA) to develop a statewide, sustainable Creative Aging program. The two agencies assembled a Creative Aging Advisory Council to recommend best practices, and then determined roles and responsibilities of the local and statewide partners
• Veterans
  The Maine Arts Commission’s Veteran Artist Resources page connects Maine veterans with opportunities in the arts. It provides information, guidance, and links to programs that support creative growth, professional development, and community engagement.

• National Organization for Arts in Health
  NOAH builds community to amplify, educate about, and advocate for the power of the arts to improve health and wellbeing for all people
  • in Health Toolkits & Publications
  • Arts in Health Jobs & Opportunities - Job board
• National Assembly of State Arts Agencies NASAA
  Arts and Health Strategy Samplers
• Creative Forces: NEA Military Healing Arts Network
  Veterans Arts & Clinical Program Funding
• The Foundation for Arts & Healing - Project UnLonely
  We champion and engage creative arts expression as a path towards improved health and wellbeing for individuals and communities. We do this by creating awareness of how the arts can address health issues, designing and offering creative expression based solutions, and partnering with organizations to fund, develop, and distribute programs that deliver measurable results.
• NeuroArts Blueprint Initiative
  The NeuroArts Blueprint: Advancing the Science of Arts, Health, and Wellbeing initiative is breaking new ground at the crossroads of science, the arts, and technology.
• Social Prescribing USA
  Social prescribing is a model of care delivery that enables health professionals to formally prescribe non-clinical community activities— including the arts, movement, nature, and service (volunteering)— to improve patient health, and at minimal patient cost.
• Art Pharmacy
  Art Pharmacy enables personalized social prescribing services with healthcare, university, corporate, and government partners to address the nation’s most intractable health challenges.