Art Therapy For Children Of Cancer Patients

By: NCC Children Therapies Committee :
Dr Tay Miah Hiang, Chairperson, Registrar, Dept of Medical Oncology, NCC
Dr Choo Su Pin, Co-Chairperson, Registrar, Dept of Medical Oncology, NCC
Mr Gilbert Fan, Programme Advisor, Manager, Medical Social Services, NCC

As an integral part of the holistic approach in cancer management, our cancer centre is proactive in harnessing awareness of cancer and understanding of the disease among patients, their children, other relatives and friends. We have young parents amongst our cancer patients. They may have young children who are mystified by the patient’s medical condition. Fear, uneasy feelings and inner sadness may abound, but they may not be able to verbalise. Such children benefit from psychological help to express their feelings and develop appropriate coping skills.

We have thus introduced therapeutic programmes such as ‘Art Therapy’ to help children to express themselves when facing a family trauma. Art therapy has been used widely for treating sexual abuse, generalised anxieties and fears as well as other traumas. Hence it is timely & innovative to implement this programme despite limited expertise and resources in helping children of cancer patients to cope with such a trauma. The sessions use non-verbal language for self-expression, to help children to convey their inner or difficult emotions and thus be able to explore and discuss issues brought forth by their parent’s illness.

Art is both methodical and metaphoric. With it, grief and emotional pain can be expressed through images, colours, lines and imagery exercises etc. We have targeted two groups of children whom we feel will benefit from this programme. One group consists of children with 'anticipatory grief' and the other group is children with 'recent bereavement'. Grouped by age, sessions are held by a trained art therapist and co-facilitated by a trained social worker or counsellor.

facing bereavement for individual art therapy sessions as well. The success of this programme is highlighted by the case of a 7-yr child. This child chose not to verbalise his thoughts and feelings, and had maintained an exceptionally high level of calmness without showing any signs of grief throughout his late father’s illness and death. During a particular art therapy session, he chose an “I-Monsters” Card that stated “I can be brave”, something that he perhaps felt represented himself. He then modified a drawing of the “I-Can” Card with a sea-monster telling the huge octopus off and a small angelfish “popping” its eyes out to scare the huge octopus away. The central theme seemed to be about this young boy being brave and fighting all the fierce creatures that were threatening his space. This illustration shows how a child who preferred not to speak could express his inner thoughts and feelings through creative activities.

We hope that we can help many more children who may be feeling very much alone, having been isolated from the adult’s world of grieving. We hope that through such therapies, children and their loved ones can be reconnected and thus develop a healthier way of coping with a family crisis such as impending suffering and loss.

For enquiries, please call Daniel Thien, Programme Executive on tel: 6436 8117 (DID) or email nsstbc@nccs.com.sg