Medical clown believes in healing power of laughter

Linda Severt, far right, and fellow clown Keith Hitchcock with a patient at Seattle Children's. (Photos courtesy Linda Severt)
Linda Severt, far right, and fellow clown Keith Hitchcock with a patient at Seattle Children’s. (Photos courtesy Linda Severt)

A hospital may seem like no place for laughter, much less a clown. But Edmonds resident and medical clown Linda Severt, AKA “Dr. Hamsterfuzz,” believes that laughter is often the best medicine.

Medical clowning involves trained clowns working in hospitals, where they visit the rooms of sick children, providing a much-needed distraction. Often the clowns will use medical parody to bring levity to the situation. The idea is essentially a fun house image of what a real doctor might do. The child can chose to either be a participant or simply lay back and enjoy the show.

“When you look at these kids, there is a sick child, but still a child,” said Severt, who emphasized the importance of “parents getting to see their child happy and playing.”

Clown antics also empower the child and give them an opportunity to have control over something during a constrained time in their lives, she added. ”The kids tell us what to do, it gives them a choice,” Severt explained. “Even if they say they don’t want to interact with the clowns, it’s still empowering and their decision!”

Severt’s experience as a performer goes back to her childhood. Since her father worked for the government, Severt and her family — including three siblings — moved about every two years. Born in Burma, Severt spent most of her childhood in Maryland and Taiwan.

Though her surroundings were constantly changing, her lively personality and love for performing were a constant. She fell in love with music in the second grade, when she learned the ukulele, which today remains her favorite instrument. From there she learned how to play the guitar, drums, percussions, melodica and some piano.

Severt’s other hobbies included surfing, which led to her love of skateboarding. Her abilities were so skilled that she entered competitions and won many of them, fueled by those who told her that “she was pretty good for a girl!” She eventually began competing against boys and beating them, and even dropped out of studying music at University of Maryland to enter skateboarding competitions.

Linda Severt with her ukelele.
Linda Severt with her ukelele.

Severt then moved to Seattle and began studying juggling. She eventually fused her juggling abilities with her love of music, and Juggletunes — a dazzling show of music, puppetry and all around silliness — was born. She toured for years with Juggletunes, which the Los Angeles Times hailed as “a tour-de-force comedic act.”

It was during this time that Severt was hired by the Big Apple Circus, the first medical clowning program in the United States. A branch of this organization became affiliated with Seattle Children’s Hospital, which became the first hospital on the West Coast to embrace medical clowning.

A mix of insufficient funds and the downturn in the economy led to the debilitation of Seattle’s Big Apple Circus Clown Care in 2009. Four years later, Severt founded Room Circus Medical Clowning with her friend and co-clown Victoria Millard, who is also the board president. Being an entertainer, Severt had access to a pool of talent from which she was able to find actors for the Room Circus. The clowns are held to incredibly high standards, so the Room Circus solely uses professional theater performers rather than well-intentioned volunteers.

“We don’t use volunteers because ultimately there is more benefit to the child if [the clowning] is done by those who are already proficient,” said Severt, who oversees the training. Once selected, these clowns are also trained by the hospital about infection control as well as patient privacy laws.

Medical clowning goes far deeper than putting a smile on a child’s face. Some studies show that medical clowning reduces anxiety in children before surgery.

Though affiliated with Seattle Children’s hospital, Room Circus Medical Clowning is its own nonprofit entity, sustaining itself with donations and grants. The troupe, consisting of four clowns, makes its rounds once a week. Room Circus has recently hired a new fund development director, “hoping to move to the next level” and be able to make the rounds multiple times a week.

Severt, the self-titled “clown wrangler,” acts as program manager as well as the chief “Doctor of Delight” for Room Circus. While she mainly works from home with administrative duties, scheduling and fundraising, she still performs at Seattle Children’s as a medical clown one day a week. And her enthusiasm for helping these children is as infectious as ever.

“Bringing joy and therapeutic laughter is intensely gratifying,” she said. “I enjoy performing for hundreds but I’d rather be at the bedside of a hospitalized child. It’s just who I am.”

— By Miranda Gillis

  1. back around 1998, Robin Williams played Dr Patch Adams about a doctor that also has similar beliefs

    he founded the Gesundheit! Foundation and takes clowns to hospitals around the world, plus a lot more . . . https://www.patchadams.org/

  2. Wonderful article! Thank you Linda & Victoria for all the “wellness” you bring to the children, families, & staff at Seattle Children’s! Keep it coming:-)

  3. A first-rate article on a program that clearly benefits so many: the children, their families and friends, the doctors and nurses who care for them, and other hospital staffers. Having helped out occasionally, I know that community support is essential to keep Room Circus alive, so let me re-post the URL for contributions.

    https://www.roomcircus.org/rcDonations.shtml

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