Frisbee golf at Cygnet Hospital Taunton helping to make lockdown fly

Frisbee golf in action

Stu Hooper, Active Life Lead at Cygnet Hospital Taunton, has recently introduced Frisbee golf to the activity programme there, and it’s gone down a storm. It is just one example of the ‘Empower Project’ that Stu has introduced to Cygnet hospitals in the South West.

The rules and basic skills are simple to grasp, allowing beginners to immediately have fun challenging themselves with fellow service users and staff. It’s just like ‘ball’ golf, the main difference being it is played by throwing a Frisbee into a target instead of hitting a ball. The aim is to send the Frisbee from a tee into a circle of cones (the hole) in the fewest throws.

A typical game can take approximately an hour, and consists of as many holes as you want, depending on the environment you have available, and can be played from standing to sitting. The game can also be adapted to football golf, and possibly other variations!

“Frisbee golf offers a unique way of connecting with our service users through physical fun. It’s inexpensive and very environmentally friendly.”Stu Hooper, Active Life Lead

Activities such as this are just one element of the “Empower Project” that Stu has developed, introduced and implemented into Cygnet hospitals in the South West. The project is a program designed to support Cygnet staff from HCA, OTA, OT, RMN and many others from the multidisciplinary team, in becoming Activators, to give them the confidence and knowledge to run activities for service users outside of core hours.

Prior to lockdown, Stu had run 11 courses in south west hospitals, with over 60 staff attending, and he hopes to be able to develop and roll this out further across the Cygnet group.

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