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Background: In 2024, a broad coalition of Dutch organizations developed the Whitepaper Arts in Health Netherlands, identifying fragmentation, limited long-term funding and the absence of structural policy as key barriers to the sustainable embedding of arts in healthcare. In 2025, the alliance initiated an implementation phase to operationalize this agenda across practice, policy, education and research.

Objectives: To contribute to and present the emerging national infrastructure that aims to embed arts in health structurally across healthcare, culture and education systems, and to share early insights from the implementation process.

Methods: The alliance has adopted a multi-sector governance model with four interconnected work packages. Implementation activities include system mapping, expert consultations, development of descriptive models for sustainable practice, and the initiation of national knowledge structures.

Results: Early outcomes include:

1. a functional cross-sector governance structure
2. ongoing descriptive modelling work to identify conditions that support sustainable arts in health practice across hospitals, long-term care and social care
3. growing alignment with national policy domains (health, culture, education);
4. strengthened research coordination and the development of a national knowledge infrastructure;
5. initial commitments from partner organizations to pilot and refine the model in practice.

Conclusion: The Dutch approach illustrates how a national alliance can transition from agenda-setting to system-level implementation. While building on work initiated by the original Whitepaper team, the ongoing implementation phase offers transferable lessons for countries seeking sustainable integration of arts in health.