Joint Base Elemendorf-Richardson has been selected as a new site to offer Military Healing Arts, a creative art therapy for service members, veterans and their families.
The program is a partnership between the National Endowment for the Arts and the Department of Defense designed to help wounded service members and their families transition into civilian life.
As chairman of the Interior-Environment Appropriations Subcommittee, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, secured $2.4 million to expand this partnership to JBER, plus Camp Pendleton, in California; Camp Lejeune, in North Carolina; Fort Hood, in Texas; and the Madigan Army Center, in Washington State.
As NEA and DoD officials visited each site, JBER stood out because of the population it serves, its state of the art facilities, the expertise of its staff and the engagement of the local community and Alaska State Council on the Arts, Murkowski said.
The Military Healing Arts program focuses on two main components of art therapy that can help enhance overall care: the clinical setting and community engagement.
The clinical setting for the program provides the multidisciplinary approach, integrating art therapists with healthcare professions to create individual treatment plans that proved successful at other locations. The community programs are designed to help connect military populations with art providers and locations in the communities where they live.
