Your votes in Tesco supermarkets are needed to help launch a new project which aims to get patients up and moving while they are in hospital.
The Occupational Therapy team at Colchester Hospital hopes Recovery Through Activity will help patients get involved in meaningful and purposeful pastimes which they will enjoy, providing both mental and physical stimulation as they recover in hospital.
Occupational therapist Emma Alder, who is part of the Elderly and Medical team at Colchester, has been successful in applying to the Tesco Bags of Help scheme for some funding for the project.
Pictured left to right is occupational therapist Emma Alder, physiotherapy assistant Josh Hall, patient Rosemary, physiotherapy assistant Catherine Bate and senior occupational therapist Laura Moxon.
–
She said: “This is all about getting patients doing things again and getting them in a routine ahead of being discharged, but it will also be good for rehabilitation and encouraging social interactions too.
“It’s so nice when patients get to know one another and walk up and down the ward to say hello, it’s part of their rehabilitation that they can do themselves. It gets you back out and talking to people and helps to build confidence as well and these activity boxes will help with that.”
The aim is to supply activity boxes throughout the wards that contain age-appropriate activities which will boost social, cognitive and physical wellbeing. These will include items such as discussion cards, large print playing cards, skittles and floor basketball.
All therapy staff and ward staff will be able to use the items to help with assessments and get patients moving and interacting while combatting pyjama paralysis too. The national End PJ Paralysis campaign to get patients up, dressed in their own clothes, and moving to boost their recovery so they can get home quicker first launched last year.
If Recovery Through Activity gets the most votes out of three shortlisted local community schemes, it would be given a cash injection of up to £4,000 which would pay for 15 activity boxes. A donation of £2,000 is given to the project in second place and £1,000 for third.
Throughout March and April, you will be able to vote at the following stores in Colchester:
- The Hythe Tesco superstore
- Highwoods Tesco Extra
- St Johns (Tesco Express)
- Magdalen Street (Tesco Express)
- Bromley Road (Tesco Express)
- Crouch Street (Tesco Express)
A blue token for voting can be picked up with every purchase – although you may have to ask for them. The voting boxes are next to the exits. The project with the most tokens at the end of the voting period will be awarded the most amount of money.
Back to top