Check Out Boston Medical Center’s New Mural for Pediatric Patients

Photo provided.

Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) students have been hard a work on a project that has nothing to do with medicine. It does, however, have a lot to do with treating patients.

Thirty students—first through fourth year—spent a weekend in February painting a mural on the wall of Boston Medical Center’s (BMC) pediatric inpatient unit. After examining research that art and healing go hand and hand, especially when it comes to patients healing in a hospital, the students worked in shifts to make the project happen quickly.

“Art is important in hospitals. Healing is not just about curing the disease, but curing the person. At [BUSM], we learn to heal the whole person and not just the disease,” says Clara Zhu, Class of 2018, who organized the painting activity to merge art and healing.

The project took about a month of planning, but the project itself was completed in just one weekend. After securing volunteers, Dr. Robert Vinci, chief and chair of pediatrics at BMC/BUSM, led Zhu through a tour of the pediatric areas to see where the best place for the mural would be.

“It was great to get students from different years interacting on the same project,” Zhu says. “It’s amazing the diversity in our school and the different talents people bring to the table.”

The pediatrics department is currently under construction, so there’s a lot of opportunity for new murals in the future. Zhu and her classmates are already planning new projects, including looking into opportunities in other wards, such as the oncology department. This new mural is part of a larger trend of area hospitals working to design a more comfortable space for patients to heal.