Celebrate Creative Arts Therapies Week with UK HealthCare's New Creative Arts Clinical Coordinator

LEXINGTON, Ky. (March 15, 2016) – UK Arts in Healthcare will be celebrating Creative Arts Therapies week with a new member on its team. The new creative arts clinical coordinator, Cheryl Benze, joined the staff at the beginning of March in the newly created position.

Benze joins the Arts in HealthCare Program from North Carolina, where she earned her bachelor's degree in psychology and music therapy as well as a master's degree in music education in music therapy. One of Benze's goals is to continue to expand the music and art therapy programs currently established at UK. By facilitating communication within the programs she hopes to see it expand within the UK community as well as the Lexington community. Benze hopes to bring continued recognition to the programs offered by UK HealthCare and the staff that keep them running.

Patients, staff, family and friends have a chance to celebrate the more than 15,000 Creative Arts Therapists practicing in the United States and around the world March 13-19, during Creative Arts Therapies Week. The growing Creative Arts Therapy Program at UKHC offers services like art and music therapy; therapists see patients throughout the UK HealthCare enterprise including the Markey Cancer Center, the Kentucky Children's Hospital and Department of Pediatrics and at Eastern State Hospital. Art expression, under the direction of a trained therapist, can help relieve stress and reduce pain for those going through difficult situations. These highly skilled and trained professionals are dedicated to using their arts to improve physical, mental and emotional health. Benze says of the program, "We are arts, we are science and we are healing."

UK is the University for Kentucky. At UK, we are educating more students, treating more patients with complex illnesses and conducting more research and service than at any time in our 150-year history. To read more about the UK story and how you can support continued investment in your university and the Commonwealth, go to: uky.edu/uk4ky. #uk4ky #seeblue

Media Contact: Olivia McCoy, olivia.mccoy1@uky.edu, 859-257-1076