The Contribution of Cultural Heritage Owned by Local Health Authorities in the Humanization of Care: The Point of View of Top Management

Martina Giusti (), Claudia Cosma, Stefania Simoni and Niccolò Persiani
Additional contact information
Martina Giusti: Department of Experimental and Clinical Medicine, University of Florence, 50134 Florence, Italy
Claudia Cosma: Department of Health Science, University of Florence, 50134 Florence, Italy
Stefania Simoni: Department of Experimental and Clinical Medicine, University of Florence, 50134 Florence, Italy
Niccolò Persiani: Department of Experimental and Clinical Medicine, University of Florence, 50134 Florence, Italy

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 24, 1-11

Abstract: After the COVID-19 pandemic, reforms in healthcare systems have the purpose to fully recover the relationship of healthcare organizations with their patients. For centuries, art was used throughout Europe in the healthcare context for its power to engage and support patients in their illnesses. This approach can be rediscovered by utilizing the cultural heritage owned by Local Health Authorities. In this context, tradition, art, innovation, and care coexist. This study aims to investigate the interest in developing projects for the humanization of care by the top management of Italian Local Health Authorities, in particular exploiting their cultural heritage. The evaluation of the proposal was conducted using semi-structured interviews with the top management of two Local Health Authorities, in which the Santa Maria Nuova hospital in Florence and the Santo Spirito in Sassia Hospital in Rome are located, as the two selected cases for this study. The interviewees welcomed the proposal to develop humanization of care projects involving the use of their cultural heritage. Moreover, they expressed their desire to invest human, economic, and structural resources in the development of these initiatives. The implementation of humanization of care projects using cultural heritage owned by Local Health Authorities is useful to apply specific policies to enhance the governance of the cultural heritage according to the health mission. On the other hand, it permits the search for additional or ad hoc resources. Finally, it is possible to humanize and improve patients’ experience while increasing awareness among the health workforce and trainees.

Keywords: patient; health impact assessment; public health resources; historical hospitals (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/24/16632/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/24/16632/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:24:p:16632-:d:1000014

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().