For several years, an Austin professor has done her part to see that patients recovering at hospitals in Africa had reading material. Now she’s helping ensure they can listen to uplifting music too.

Barb Houle, who teaches psychology at Riverland Community College, started Read to Recovery in 2010, a program to give books to patients in Swaziland hospitals. In June, Houle expanded the program to send the music of Austin group Spiritually Motivated to patients in Swaziland.

Houle heard Spiritually Motivated at church and was deeply moved by the music and the inspirational messages. She wanted to share the music, which she described as calming, soothing and peaceful, with others.

“If it has that type of effect on me than I’m thinking that it would for the patients as well,” Houle said. “I think this would help them.”

Along with sending books to Africa for Read to Recovery, Houle is now working to provide the CDs to help give patients strength as they recover in hospitals. After asking hospitals if they had sound equipment to play the disks, she said staff was excited to receive music along with books.

Houle got the idea for Read to Recovery when visiting friends in Africa. They visited someone in the hospital, and Houle noticed the room, which held a number of patients on cot-like-beds, didn’t provide anything for patients to do to pass the time. There were no TVs, no magazines or books, and nothing for recovering patients to look at.

“They looked just bored,” Houle said.

Houle thought bringing books to the patients would help pass the time and keep their minds busy. She shared the idea with her friend and colleague Lindiwe Sibisi, who lives in Swaziland, and they started the Read to Recovery program.

“When you read you’re taken to far-away lands and on adventures,” Houle said. “These people are so appreciative, they have nothing, and just for something to do while they’re recovering, hopefully it will help them pass time away and maybe give them energy.”

The program gives books to patients to read during their stay at the hospital. The books are wheeled around on a cart to each patient in the ward and signed out as people choose them. They then sign the book back in when they either finish reading it or are being discharged from the hospital. This ensures the books stay at the hospital for future patients to enjoy.

“All they have is time on their hands, just nothing to do, and I thought, wouldn’t it be great if they had something to read?” Houle said.

The CDs and books have been distributed to four hospitals in Swaziland so far, with plans to reach seven. Along with books, organizations have donated money to ship the books to Swaziland.

Spiritually Motivated, an off-shoot of the Adult Choir at Austin’s St. Augustine Catholic Church, began as an ecumenical choral group in 1997, under the guidance of choral director Jan Muzik. After a hiatus, the group was reborn when Jim King, of Eighth Avenue Recording in Austin, enlisted former members Michael Veldman, Erin Schumacher, Faye Bollingberg, Brendhan Wagner, Brian Bawek and Jan Muzik to help create an album, with all the proceeds going to cancer research at the Hormel Institute.

For Read to Recovery, Houle accepts books from a variety of places and for a variety of categories. She said they take any type of book people donate: fiction, non-fiction, novels, drama, adventure, and anything else people donate. She hopes to keep patients busy during their stay, and provide them with some sort of entertainment.

“To distract them, keep their mind off their recovery,” Houle said.