Evaluation of the Cultural Cwtsh

The Cultural Cwtsh was created as a direct response to the pandemic and the impact it was having on healthcare staff dealing with pressures on the frontline which was resulting in exhaustion, burn-out and severe stress. In consultation with our partners within Health & Social Care and working with a wide range of artists across Wales, the Arts Council developed a bespoke, online creative wellbeing resource for the Healthcare workforce in Wales. The Cultural Cwtsh is a bilingual online resource endorsed by Health Education Improvement Wales. It is inspired by a growing body of evidence showing the positive impact the arts can have on our mental health and wellbeing. Full of fun activities, the Cultural Cwtsh invites health and social care colleagues to switch off from work, discover their own creativity and unlock the wellbeing benefits.This unique resource, created in consultation with Health Education Improvement Wales and Social Care Wales, features bitesize activities from some of Wales’ leading artists. It aims to boost health and wellbeing through the arts, offering staff some inspiration and fun, comfort, relaxation and restorative ‘time out’.Activities range from portrait painting and creative writing to nature exploration, Bollywood dancing, singing, photography, juggling and animation. All content is on video and free to access on demand.To find out more, visit culturalcwtsh.walesWe are looking to commission an evaluation of the Cultural Cwtsh. Two years into its development, we want to assess the extent to which it is achieving its aim of supporting the wellbeing of the Healthcare workforce in Wales. Specifically, we want to find out: how this online resource is being used by staff working within the NHS and Social Care in Wales and the benefits and impact it is having on their wellbeing where and how the audience accesses and uses the website the demographic profile of users familiarity and penetration of the website within the workforce factors preventing staff from using the Cultural Cwtsh the user experience and how it might be improved the value of the content commissioned by the project to healthcare staff - what content appeals most to users and what is less successful / useful? ideas for future content development based on user feedback, needs and requirements what users think about the Cultural Cwtsh brand and identityWe expect the evaluation to provide us with quantitative and qualitative data to support its findings. We envisage user focus groups will form an important element of the work.The evaluation should also explore whether there is the demand from Health & Social Care to sustain the resource in support of staff wellbeing in the longer-term and what a future sustainable financial model might look like.We will use the evaluation’s findings and recommendations to inform our future strategy in relation to the Cultural Cwtsh. We will also use it to help guide our future commissioning of content and website design and development.