If laughter is indeed the best medicine, then children in one Queensland hospital are being administered a healthy dose by the clown doctors wandering their wards.
Brisbane stand-up comic Jenny Wynter has joined the laughter therapy circuit as part of the Humour Foundation, which aims to ease some of the pain and boredom for sick kids, many of whom are confined to their beds for months at a time.
Ms Wynter, also known as Doctor Kerchoo, has already made something of a name for herself in her industry, but said her latest gig was much tougher.
“I’m a clowntern – that means that I’m doing a clown traineeship basically for my first 50 rounds in the hospital,” she said.
“I’m working under the guidance of other clown doctors. I have a mentor, Lou, or Doctor Wobble, who is there to guide me and supervise and debrief and kind of really take me under her wing to show me the ropes.”
The duo’s special brand of medicine is dispensed liberally to everyone they meet.
“What clown doctors do is they help children enter the world of play, and when they’re using their imagination they can actually cope with things in different ways,” Ms Wynter said.
“You’re creating so many moments and bits and pieces of comedy that will never be repeated again, and there’s something beautiful about that, and sharing that with the kids, that that moment is just for them and it won’t happen again like that.”
Louise Brehmer, also known as Doctor Wobble, said the children always came first.
“One of the core goals of the clown doctor is to make the child the highest status in the room, so we always seek their permission for a visit before entering their space, which I think is really important given that they’re often in an environment where things are done to them,” she said.
Clown doctor work is medicinal for themselves
What patients may not know is the work is medicinal for clown doctors, as well.
Last year, Ms Wynter learnt to never under estimate the power of a good laugh while caring for her dying mum Lainey at home.
“She was cracking jokes right up till near the end, and comedy was a really big dose of pain relief for us,” Ms Wynter said.
“I knew I still wanted to do something in the comedy realm.
“I’ve got these skills and I love doing it but I really wanted to have something that would just give me more of the purpose that I felt in taking care of mum.
“Because as excruciating and ripped open and raw as that experience was, I felt so much purpose in doing that for her – it felt like important work.”
An internet ad for the clown doctors was a Godsend, she said.
“In stand-up, I kind of do have the highest status in the room, because I have the microphone, I’m in control, I’m going to lead this party everybody, you’re going to listen – if you heckle I will sort that out,” Ms Wynter said.
“Whereas the clown is very low status and empowers the child and empowers the parents with the higher status, so it’s a different world, so that’s a challenge for me.”
‘It’s just a really wonderful thing that they do’
For Andrew Poynting, you cannot put a price on the happiness clown doctors bring to his daughter Amy.
The 10-year-old, who has been battling cancer for about six years, has been in Lady Cilento Children’s Hospital in Brisbane lately for further treatment after a bone marrow transplant.
“It’s a pretty painful progress, pretty painful situation she’s endured over the years,” Mr Poynting said.
“People use that term roller coaster, and it certainly is in the depths that you go to and the heights, you know, when the situation is such that you really do reach a new low in the heartache for your child what they’re going through, and trying to save them.
“The clown doctors will magically appear and for a second, or a couple of minutes, or even 15 minutes they’ll take the child – or Amy’s – mind off the situation at hand, and you can’t put a price on that, and it’s just a really wonderful thing that they do.”
Gladstone resident Tanya Wilkinson said her daughter Abi, who has been living in intensive care for the past 16 months, relished any chance she got to see the clown doctors.
Abi was injured in a car accident that left her with a broken neck and crushed spinal cord.
She can no longer walk or breathe on her own.
“It’s been a very long, hard road – she’s been a very able-bodied little four-year-old girl – or three-year-old when the accident happened – and now, not being able to do anything she relies on me for everything now, it’s very hard,” Ms Wilkinson said.
“She lives in intensive care – it’s a very hard atmosphere to live in.”
She said the clown doctors had been helpful in letting her daughter act her age, as well as in her development.
“She’s a four-year-old communicating with adults 24/7 – she doesn’t just get to run away to her room and be a four-year-old girl.
“Having the clown doctors here they adapt their playtime to Abby’s level … so they’ll talk about things that are inappropriate for other children, but she loves it.
“She relishes it, she looks forward them and asks for them – it’s nice to see her happy like this.
“Clown doctors are fantastic – they’ve been a very big help in her development.”
Clown doctors help patients to relax: psychologist
Embedding clown doctors into health units could change the culture of the hospital for the better, senior psychologist Dr Alan Headey said.
“We shift towards ‘we need to care for the whole person here, not just their bodies’. And that’s really crucial,” he said.
Dr Headey said clown doctors worked on three different levels.
“First is making kids feel better. They make them feel happy, improve their morale and crucially when maybe bad stuff is happening they make them feel less anxious, less worried … they forget about their worries for a little while which is just fantastic,” he said.
“The second thing when parents see their kids laughing and playing and coming up with creative idea, parents feel better, they feel less stressed.
“When parents are less stressed and start joking with kids they’re able to help their children in creative ways and that’s really crucial.
“Parents are the people who calm us down when we’re children … they make the difference. So helping kids and parents together is fantastic.
“The third thing which is sometimes missed … it has a really big effect on staff … we feel less stressed, we feel happier and when we’re less stressed we can play around with patients.
“That helps them trust us better, they have better relationships with us, we can communicate more effectively.”
Dr Headey said previous studies have looked at what worked better at calming children down – interacting with clown doctors or preoperative anaesthetics.
“A clown doctor was more effective than a drug,” he said.
“One of the real questions is ‘how does humour affect these children?’ One of the things we know is it does seem to lower blood pressure … it changes heart rate responses.
“Those physiological responses are telltale signs that anxiety is going down.”