London Arts and Health had the opportunity to visit the in-person retreat of Diabetes UK’s Clinical Champions Programme.
The programme aims to develop system leaders who start small from where they are, include marginalized voices and lead together to advocate for and work towards diabetes care.
It is a 1.5 year programme to build capabilities and connections of healthcare professionals from across the UK. The collaborative programme engages with healthcare professionals, community leaders, and people with lived experience. The focus of the training programme this year is to get diabetes essential care right for all.
In the in-person training, the participants were engaging in a legislative theatre play to address the issues of systemic racism, structural challenges, and knowledge gaps in accessing diabetes care. The training was led by Tony Cealy and members of the Black Men’s Consortium as they performed the play which focussed on social depravation and racism in diabetes care and followed it with inviting the participants to ‘play out’ opportunities of change to tackle the inequalities. This led to a rich discussion and participation by the audience using theatre as a tool of demonstrating change and catalysing dialogues on potential challenges and alternatives.
The first half of the training day was then followed by discussions and reflections on mapping the current system of care and exploring the future through envisioning activities.
The training day was an immersive experience and encouraged participants to envision and demonstrate change in their areas of work and beyond by scoping opportunities to impact the wider system.
The Clinical Champions Programme is currently running two cohorts for the year 2024-25 and if you are interested to know more about their work or would like to get in touch with a Clinical Champion in your local area to drive change together, you can visit their website to engage further.