HUMOR IN MEDICINE

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THE ROLE OF HUMOR IN HEALTH CARE

Health care humor potentially fulfills the following functions4, 9:

  • Narrows cultural and socioeconomic interpersonal gaps

  • Relieves anxiety

  • Communicates messages

  • Provides and acceptable outlet for anger and frustration

  • Enhances healing

  • Communicates caring

Nontherapeutic uses of humor, humor in the presence but exclusive of the patient, can do the reverse: widen interpersonal gaps, increase anxiety, prevent communication, promote anger, impede healing, and express a lack of concern. Fortunately,

DOES THE HUMOR REALLY MATTER?

The importance of using humor in health care has been well documented in a variety of settings. Nursing units that routinely use humor have higher staff and patient satisfaction. Many studies have been done of the physiologic effects of laughter; a positive impact on circulatory7 and respiratory status,8 relaxation,3 and immune function,2, 6, 9 has been detected. Hospitalized patients who are less passive and who take more control have improved outcomes; as mentioned previously, humor is one

Anxiety Threshold

One of the challenges facing health care providers is knowing when initiating humor is not appropriate. In fact, there do not appear to be any specific topics or aspects of care that preclude humor. Humor has been used to help patients cope with all aspects of wellness and illness. No subjects are absolutely taboo.

A proper and private woman was being treated for cervical cancer including intravaginal radiation therapy. This required many pelvic examinations by different professionals. As her

Humor With Children

When people meet a funny doctor they often ask if he or she cares for children. In fact, humor with kids can be helpful but should look quite different than humor with adults.5 The verbal content is replaced by playfulness, magic, slapstick, body humor, music, and facial expressions. As with adults, humor helps to relieve anxiety but these are generally the immediate anxieties associated with the office visit.

An almost infinite number of variations to physician-child humor are practiced. The

LEARNING TO USE HUMOR

Some people can tell a joke and some cannot. Some providers generate humor readily and spontaneously and others rarely elicit a smile let alone a guffaw. No matter how important humor may be to primary care, is it possible to change one's style to take advantage of humor's therapeutic power. Studies confirm significant variation in individuals' tendency to generate or appreciate humor.10, 22, 23 Given that it is critical to be natural and comfortable, is humor right for all physicians?

The

SUMMARY

A 56-year-old woman with chronic somatization was perpetually fearful that she had a terminal illness. One thing she had going for her was a 15-year relationship with a doctor who shared the lighter side of life with her. Her doctor once said, ``Someday I'm going to find something wrong with you, and we won't know what to do. We'll be so surprised!'' The patient was commenting that despite that fact that she felt terrible, her friends told here she looked good. She then added, ``I'm just glad

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  • Cited by (25)

    • Impairments of humour comprehension in multiple sclerosis

      2020, Multiple Sclerosis and Related Disorders
      Citation Excerpt :

      Thus, the inability to perceive this second degree of language is likely to generate a major social handicap. Humour has also been reported to form part of physician-patient encounters (Wender, 1996; Berger et al., 2004): its impairment is thus likely to disrupt medical follow-up of MS patients. According to incongruity theory, humour comprehension is a high-level cognitive process that comprises two steps (Fig. 1): incongruity detection and incongruity resolution (Vrticka et al., 2013; Wu et al., 2013).

    • Humor

      2014, Psychiatric Clinics of North America
      Citation Excerpt :

      The approach to humor in medicine seems to be changing. Even in primary care, humor is being given more importance.16,17 Hospitals are now using clowns to help with humor.18

    • Therapeutic value of humor

      2002, Medicina Clinica
    • The Use of Humor in Palliative Care: A Systematic Literature Review

      2018, American Journal of Hospice and Palliative Medicine
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    Address reprint requests to Richard C. Wender, MD, Department of Family Medicine, Jefferson Medical College, Thomas efferson University, 1015 Walnut Street, Suite 401, Philadelphia, PA 19107

    *

    From the Department of Family Medicine, Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

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