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Hello, welcome to the seventeenth issue of the Flourishing Spaces Newsletter~ a small offering to pause as we approach the end of summer. We aim to connect a growing community committed to re-humanising medicine and education through creativity, reflection, and care. This isn’t about adding more noise to your inbox but some encouragement, a signpost to something meaningful, and a glimpse into what’s unfolding in our shared landscape. In this addition we aim to showcase the changes we have observed over the past year, our insights into Human Dimension and our wishes for the future. All previous newsletters can be read here (scroll to the bottom of the page). ___________________________________________________________________
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“When symptoms have no structural explanation, the patient's trajectory through healthcare is often very different from the one they expected. There is no broken bone to set, no tumour to remove, no clear pathway out. Instead, many of us find ourselves in new and unknown territory, trying to navigate a strange land with no map, and encountering paradigms of health and illness we never knew existed. Along the way, the journey itself is often traumatising, carrying with it loss, fear and the gradual breakdown of trust in the system that is trying to help us.“ — Louise McAllan, Recovery practitioner (In press: Journal of Holistic Healthcare, vol 23, Issue 2, section titled: Seen and held: creating containers for healing, Reflections from Chronic illness and recovery )
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Beyond the Bleep podcast In a new series of the podcast ‘Beyond the Bleep’, run by GP Feyisara Mendes, Professor Louise Younie talks in episode 1 about how creative health can be used to better help clinicians become more connected to the human dimension of medicine. |
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“…so much of our training and practice is very unidimensional. The biomedical model is important but is not the whole picture…But there is another side of the human dimension. The question there would be, how can I help you, rather than, what is your diagnosis?…” — Professor Louise Younie Watch the full episode on youtube here Listen on Spotify here, alterantively it is also avalable on Apple Podcasts
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Rehumanising healthcare depends not only on what we value, but on how those values are experienced in everyday practice. At Wild-Ness Health, the Weave describes two forms of expertise that modern healthcare needs: scientific knowledge and technical skill, alongside practical wisdom and relational skill. The challenge is often translating that human dimension from an aspiration into the habits, relationships and conditions that shape what happens each day.
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Our 12 Habits of Whole-Person Practice invite health professionals to notice the small choices within their own control and influence. The Culture Compass widens the lens, helping teams explore how their environment supports—or hinders—safety, trust, autonomy, collaboration and meaningful participation. Together, the tools connect personal practice with cultural change. They are not assessments or fixed instructions but starting points for reflection and conversation: helping us notice what has become normal, make sense of its effects and create conditions in which people can flourish. For those interested in exploring how these ideas might translate into everyday practice, free professional membership of the Wild-Ness Learning Library includes 30-minute courses on the 12 Habits and the Culture Compass, a Seasonal Learning Journal and opportunities to connect with others exploring this work.
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Human values in healthcare forum 3rd October 2026, 9am to 5pm Repair, restore, resurge. The art and craft of healing ourselves, others and our communities. In person. Open to all in health and social care. - The Royal Foundation of St Katharine, London An interdisciplinary all-day in-person conference.
This annual event, set within a supportive and peaceful setting, is designed to offer hope, inspiration and replenishment to all those working in health and social care as well as educational resources to guide and support compassionate, relational care. This interactive event will offer the opportunity for participants to explore and share their values, restorative strategies and stories of successful interactions/interventions to reach a shared and broader understanding of how to sustain themselves, to build collective resilience and to effect change in systems which are dysfunctional and dehumanising in need of repair. Book via this link (From Journal of Holistic Healthcare, Volume 23, Issue 1, Spring 2026)
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The Della Fish Foundation Chester Conference
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We are so grateful to the Della Fish Foundation for their funding and support in our Human Dimension scholarship and practice development. If you would like to learn more about the Della Fish Foundation and application for funding, please see below.
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More Than the Diagnosis: Five Years of the GP SIG for Creative Health Webinar 16th September 2026, 7pm to 8:30pm The RCGP - NCCH Creative Health SIG’s upcoming webinar is explorative for primary healthcare and beyond, discussing the evolution and rise of Creative Health and how it has shaped practice. Allowing space for participants to reflect and connect with colleagues. Learn more and register via this link
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A NOTE FROM FLOURISHING SPACES
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The Human Dimension One of the central findings from the first year of our Della Fish Foundation project is that the Human Dimension cannot simply be approached as another curriculum topic. It is better understood as an orientation to healthcare, one that attends to the human, relational and wider contexts in which learning, care and professional life take place. This has taken the work in directions we did not entirely anticipate emerging through relationships, conversations and growing connections, perhaps appropriate for a project increasingly informed by thinking about complex and living systems. Alongside developing scholarship, educational thinking, curriculum approaches and creative engagement, a growing community of students, patients, clinicians and educators has begun to gather around these ideas. We are particularly grateful to Dr Elle Tallgren and Eisha Hussain for helping us bring different voices into the conversation through these newsletters. Over the past year we have co-edited a series in the Journal of Holistic healthcare exploring the Human Dimension, Flourishing Spaces and Shadow Work, with Trauma-Informed Care forthcoming, created a student–staff–patient exhibition exploring inclusion in healthcare; collaborated with the Muse Meets Medicine festival (video); written publications and invited talks; and an international book co-edited with Professor Chris Dowrick, Creative Arts and the Human Dimension in Healthcare, is now nearing completion. What is emerging The Human Dimension is an emerging rather than established educational field. It is relational and participatory, rather than simply a body of knowledge to be taught. Creative enquiry offers one important way of learning within this dimension. There is considerable interest in exploring this work across institutions, professions and countries.
This matters because the counter-currents are strong. As Klaber and colleagues recently observed, “The currents pulling healthcare away from its human dimension are structural, powerful, and, in some parts of the world, accelerating.” A look to the future We hope this can remain an open and generative space: somewhere to encounter other people working with similar questions, share emerging practice and help shape where the field goes next. Perhaps, then, this is a good moment to gather. Look out for upcoming opportunities to connect. We will share in the Newsletter and on @Flourishing spaces on LinkedIn.
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“What is the most resilient parasite? Bacteria? A virus? An intestinal worm? An idea. Resilient... highly contagious. Once an idea has taken hold of the brain it's almost impossible to eradicate. An idea that is fully formed - fully understood - that sticks; right in there somewhere.” —Inception (2010), directed by Christopher Nolan __________
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If there’s something stirring for you after reading this, or if you simply want to say hello, we’re always here, just email us at creativeenquiry@gmail.com. With warmth, The Flourishing Spaces Team Edited by Eisha Hussain, First Year Medical student at Barts And the London School of Medicine and Dentistry ———————————————————————————— FLOURISHING SPACES
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