Laugh to live

This Ticino company founded in 2004 helps to smile in difficult moments, with our help we want to donate a scholarship to train a CLOWN DOCTOR because giving a smile to a person who suffers makes everyone’s heart smile.

The Laugh for Vivere Ticino association was founded in 2004 by joining the International Federation for Laughing for Living. He works in the field of gelotology above all through the professional figure of the Clown Doctor and the Smile Volunteer and the Gelotologist. These operators work in all places of health and social hardship: pediatric hospital wards; hospital wards for adults; with healthy, frail elderly people, with dementia; in the sphere of handicap; in the sphere of psychiatry; in prisons; in districts at risk; with “very lively” children; in the third world … in all those situations in which bringing a positive emotion means activating levels of self-healing.

They are professional socio-health workers who work through the arts of clowning (comedy, humor, prestidigitation, theatrical improvisation, music, puppets, etc …) to change the sign of the negative emotions of people who find themselves in health and / or social difficulties . Their task is to play down health care practices, change the sign of negative emotions, such as fear, anger, disappointment, sadness, make them express, manage them and turn them to the positive, towards a smile, courage, hope, joy, laughter.

They wear a variously colored gown, always work in pairs, carrying out a real “visit tour” in every single room or intervene during medications or invasive examinations of various kinds. The Clown Doctors work closely with the health team and each of their interventions is preceded by brief information moments with the staff of the department, in order to be able, from time to time, in a flexible and rapid way, to choose the the most appropriate type of intervention to be implemented with individual children: the intervention of the Clown Doctor is always “ad personam”, calibrated according to need and never a simple repetitive “show”. Several researches carried out in Italian hospitals (see Homo Ridens) have demonstrated the therapeutic effectiveness of Clown Doctors in the ward wards

The intervention of the Clown Doctors involves the entire hospital community: their presence is able to radically change the atmosphere of the wards, involving not only the users but also the relatives present. Health personnel also benefit from their service, as well as directly (the Clown Doctor knows how to interact with adults), even indirectly, since by lowering the levels of anxiety, it facilitates the relationship. This means that the Clown Doctor is also a Community Creator.