Training arts professionals in healthy practice skills is vital, but we believe that healthy individuals also require systematic support from the industry that is built on their work.
The majority of workers in the performing arts are freelancers and all are likely to, at some point in their career, experience an injury or have other health problems as a result of their work. The particular needs of those in this industry translate to other areas of the national workforce where, with the expansion of the ‘gig-economy’, traditional occupational health provision increasingly may not reach.
The Occupational Medicine Section of the Royal Society of Medicine and the British Association for Performing Arts Medicine have therefore come together to run a one day educational meeting that will be of interest to a wide range of people with an interest in health and work.
Talks and panels feature leading arts industry and occupational health experts, academics and clinicians, and include consideration of the economic case for investing in health, health promotion, injury prevention and rehabilitation for self-employed workers, key and emerging occupational health issues in the arts sector.
Contributors include:
Professor Aaron Williamon, Royal College of Music, Centre for Performance Science
Zeb Soanes, BBC Radio 4 presenter
Jane Dyball, CEO of Music Publishers Association Group, winner of Music Week Women in Music Award for Outstanding Contribution
Professor Emma Redding, Head of Dance Science, Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance
Colin Thomas, Chief Medical Officer, BBC
Colonel John Etherington, Director of Defence Rehabilitation and Consultant in Rheumatology and Rehabilitation, Defence Medical Rehabilitation Centre