Study tests healing power of laughter

They also are asking whether such complementary approaches also ease pain, nausea and other treatment side effects as well as help patients recover faster and leave the hospital sooner. They landed a five-year, $2 million National Cancer Institute grant to find out.

The study will involve 282 patients ages 6 through 18 undergoing stem cell transplants at St. Jude and children’s hospitals in Toronto, Philadelphia and Columbus, Ohio.

Clayton Mitchell, 18, of Paragould, Ark., is one of 16 patients enrolled so far. Like 75 percent of the expected volunteers, he is battling leukemia.

“We won’t cure them with massage, but we may improve the outcome,” said Dr. Sean Phipps, a clinical psychologist in St. Jude’s behavioral medicine division and the study’s principal investigator.

Although research is just beginning in children, studies in adult cancer patients show such strategies help ease pain, increase energy and improve mood. Some also suggest they help patients live longer, although that hasn’t been clearly established.

For the St. Jude study, patients are randomly assigned to one of three groups. One-third receive standard care, including support from staff in the hospital’s pastoral care, child life and psychology departments. Another third receive half-hour massages three times a week as well as weekly humor therapy and encouragement to take daily humor breaks.

Mitchell is among the final third. That group includes patients and parents. He gets humor therapy — think whoopie cushions, Three Stooges videos and silly games — and the regular massages.

His mother, Debbie Williams, is on the same massage schedule. She also gets guided imagery and relaxation training, including a compact disc designed for daily use.

During the first six weeks of Mitchell’s hospital stay, mother and son are completing weekly questionnaires asking about everything from his mood to his symptoms. They’ll complete another set at weeks 12 and 24.

The research reflects psychology’s new appreciation of the complexity of the stress response.

“You can experience positive and negative . . . at the same time or in the course of a day. A positive experience serves as a buffer against the physical ravages of stress,” Phipps explained.

It also reminds patients of how they can help themselves, even if it is just startling a nurse with a plastic cockroach.

Williams was initially skeptical she would be able to relax knowing what her son is going through. Mitchell’s acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) was diagnosed in 1999. He was referred to St. Jude from Arkansas Children’s Hospital when the cancer returned in August. He entered St. Jude on Feb. 9.

After doctors used chemotherapy to kill Mitchell’s own diseased blood-producing bone marrow, he received stem cells donated by his brother, Clinton, 23. The hope is those cells will settle into Mitchell’s bone marrow and rebuild his blood and his immune system.

If he’s lucky he will be able to leave the hospital in mid-March and head home in May.

Mitchell said he would miss the massages.

“I’ll have to find a girlfriend who is a masseuse,” he joked.

(Copyright 2004 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)