My Core: conveying the everyday normality of living with congenital heart disease

Feeling different, that others do not understand what it is really like to live with congenital heart disease (CHD), is a frequent lament of patients, sometimes resulting in social isolation and a failure to maximise opportunities afforded by successful treatment. Patients can disengage from health care, with potentially deleterious consequences for themselves and their families, health care systems and wider society. But what is the answer—how do we help patients to normalise their experience whilst at the same time enabling those around them to gain a greater appreciation of what life is like for them? Art-making can be one way of addressing this and we present an example of our experience, engaging patients in the process.