“It surprised me a lot, I did not expect it,” he says Silvia FernandezPrincess of Girona Social Award 2023. Just a few hours after be recognized for its initiative “Palliative Art”, Born with the aim of accompanying people at the end of their lives with art, she answers the phone with LA RAZÓN to describe the path she has traveled to value the emotions of patients in healthcare settings.
During the opening in Zaragoza of the Talent Tour, an initiative of the Princess of Girona Foundation that travels through different cities in Spain – in this edition it will reach Valladolid, Lugo, Córdoba and Girona in the coming months as well as Zaragoza – to connect with the potential of young people, the first of the awards was made public, which will be delivered in the summer with the presence of Princess Leonor, who is the Honorary President since the proclamation of her father as King on June 19, 2014. «It is a very important recognition for me and my entire team that encourages us to continue working to alleviate suffering through emotional, social and spiritual accompaniment”, he explains.
Silvia Fernández, the heart of «Palliative Art», has a degree in Social Education, with a master’s degree in Counseling, another in Clinical Research and studies in Art Therapy. At just 30 years old, his foundation cares for between 1,000 and 2,500 people each year in hospitals, residences and at home. Specifically, the seven employees and volunteers that it has have a wide presence in Catalonia, where they provide their services in centers such as the Sant Joan de Déu Maternity and Children’s Hospital or the Terrasa Hospital, although they aspire to extend their work to more all Spain. “We are working on a pilot project with the Niño Jesús Hospital in Madrid”assures.
«Through an individual process of artistic expression we accompany the emotional, social and spiritual dimension of those people who are in a hospitalization process». This is how Silvia Fernández describes her work, that she found some stones in her beginnings due to the lack of confidence of some specialists. “At first the doctors and nurses were not responsible for the results,” she explains, a refusal that over the years has been overcome thanks to the results in patients.
Not surprisingly, his commitment to medicine being more integrative and addressing that more emotional and spiritual part is the result of his personal experience. He started the foundation for her sister, who suffers from an undiagnosed rare disease. «Music therapy went very well and it impacted me as a child, to the point that I decided to study it». Also in her family environment, she found positive results in the relationship between accompaniment and art. “My grandmother got sick and was my first patient.”
Yesterday, Silvia had the opportunity to chat with the King, who attended the presentation of the Talent Tour of the Princess of Girona Foundation. “He congratulated me and encouraged me to work every day as before”. In addition, both commented on the extraordinary work carried out by the Spanish Federation for Rare Diseases (Feder), an organization with which Queen Letizia works hand in hand to make her work visible.