Beads of Courage®, a form of arts-in-medicine, was developed by pediatric oncology nurse Jean Baruch in the United States. The Beads of Courage® Program is a resilience-based intervention designed to support and strengthen the protective resources for children coping with serious illness.
Children fighting cancer and other serious illnesses receive colorful beads as meaningful symbols of courage to commemorate milestones they have achieved along their unique treatment path. Each bead tells a story of strength, honor, and hope.
The patients keep a record of all of their treatments in their Bead Diary. Designated medical professionals (including nurses, clinical psychologists, and child life specialists) are trained by Shine On! Kids to become Bead Ambassadors. These Ambassadors meet with each child once a week to talk about their treatments that week, listen to the children talk about how they feel, and together go through the Bead Diary and collect the child’s beads.
On average, a child undergoing treatment for cancer will collect about 900 beads in one year of treatment. The beads themselves are high-quality glass, ceramic and polymer—strung together, they are both beautiful and very heavy. The weight and length of the bead strands also serve as a reminder of the long and courageous journey these young people must embark upon to get better.
Strand length represents ONE WEEK of treatment