Integrating Lonely Elderly Patients in Workshops in a Cartoon Museum: An Efficacy Study

Social relationships are important to people and it affects their quality of life, morbidity and mortality. This is a randomised controlled trial studying the effect of including older people with impaired social relationships and a perception of loneliness at workshops, at The Storm P. Museum - a museum about the well known Danish cartoonist Robert Storm Petersen. The hypothesis is, that by including older lonely people with a impaired social participation in these workshops, they will increase the participants health related quality of life. The investigators also hypothesis, that the intervention will improve the participants perception of loneliness, social participation and physical function. The intervention consist of a series of workshops at the Storm P. Museum. At these workshops the participants will create memory material for nursing home residents with dementia. The museum staff will facilitate a process of storytelling, using events, significant stories and artistic works by Storm P. and encourage the participants, by means of the "narrative interview" method to share similar stories from their life.