A two-acre woodland healing garden is part of Walter Reed National Military Medical Center’s Healing Through Arts program that began as a way to treat post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in active-duty military personnel, according to an article on the Health Facilities Management website.

The Green Road project is a prime example of using the least invasive means to heal patients, the article said.

The project encompasses a half-mile-long Americans with Disabilities Act-compliant green corridor that links to the Bethesda, Md., hospital campus. 

“What sets the Green Road apart is that most healing gardens are respite or rehab gardens and very manicured; this is different because it’s a wild garden and it’s an effort to heal with wild nature,” says Frederick Foote, a retired U.S. Navy physician who helped to found the Healing Through Arts program and acted as project director on the Green Road. 

Read the article.