Le Rire Médecin

Who are we ?

Le Rire Médecin, created in 1991, dreams of a world where all hospitalized children, especially the most vulnerable ones and youngest ones will have allies by their side that will help them restore the carelessness of their age, listen to them, understand them, bring them play, imagination, fantasy, and make them laugh.

The professional clown actors from Le Rire Médecin are trained to the specific needs of hospital environment, and accompany children in order to minimize the impact of hospitalization. The overall objective is to help children remain children while not forgetting parents, caregivers, and supervisors.

Le Rire Médecin is a pioneer in the development and recognition of the profession of hospital clown and aspires to remain one of the major players in the French and European Federations. In order to operate in full cooperation with the healthcare teams, the Association aims at expanding their operations by promoting innovation, creativity, and by further strengthening its integration within the hospital’s organizations.

Le Rire Médecin also has a mission to pass on knowledge and contribute to the profession of hospital clown’s influence. In order to live out this mission, Le Rire Médecin has created their own Training Institute which includes training hospital clowns, showcasing their know-how, the quality of their actions, and their professionalism. By using this approach, the Association wishes to promote the playful approach in the child care process leading to the recognition of the beneficial contribution of clown play as an essential component of the care protocol.

          

The missions of Le Rire Médecin are the following :

• Set professional artists for improvised and tailor-made duo shows throughout France all year round for children in vulnerable situations
• Bring life, joy, lightness, poetry, laughter and humor to help children go through difficult times in sickness
• Accompany children in their care path and parents to better live the experience of hospitalization
• Intervene alongside caregivers while being fully integrated into the hospital environment
• Participate to a benevolent care process for children
• Promote the therapeutic benefit of laughter through a playful approach of medical care while also conducting research and evaluating the results of actions
• Contribute to the official recognition and the influence of the profession of hospital clown in France and abroad while ensuring the transmission of our know-how and providing quality training
• Promote professional best practices especially within the collective of associations of hospital clowns (FFACH, EFHCO, ...)

Operations conducted in 48 medical wards in the following 16 hospitals :

• Necker Hospital - Sick Children (Paris)
• Armand Trousseau Children's Hospital (Paris)
• Robert Debré Hospital (Paris)
• Jean Verdier Hospital (Bondy)
• Bicêtre Hospital (Le Kremlin Bicêtre)
• Gustave Roussy (Villejuif)
• Louis Mourier Hospital (Colombes)
• Ambroise Paré Hospital (Boulogne)
• Intercommunal Hospital of Créteil
• Nantes University Hospital Center
• Angers University Hospital Center
• Gatien Hospital in Clocheville (University Hospital of Tours)
• Orléans Regional Hospital Center
• Nancy University Hospital Center - Brabois Hospital
• La Timone – Children Hospital (Marseille)
• Children hospitalized at home with the Hospitals de Paris

Executive summary

In 2019, Le Rire Médecin has allowed nearly 80,000 hospitalized children to benefit from professional duo-comedian-clowns shows.

In addition to this main mission, Le Rire Médecin continues the following pilot programs:

• Helping babies and mothers who have difficulty with their newborn (Mater-Nez program)
• Helping parents of hospitalized children, to help them better accompany their child during hospitalization (Récré des Parents program)
• Helping children victims of diverse abuses, within the Young Victims Unit of Orleans (UAJV) program

  

Due to covid-19, we launched in may 2020 a brand new program based on visioconference between hospitalized children and clowns.

To find our 2018-2019 activity report, it's here.

The details of our 2020 project

We are launching a new multi-year associative project named Etoile 2025. It is made of 25 actions relating to the development of the association and its resources, in order to pass the milestone of 100,000 visits to hospitalized children per year. The goal of this project is to allow Le Rire Médecin to keep opening new programs in more medical units and in more hospitals.

It also deals with:

• the artistic organization
• the evolution and the recognition of the profession of hospital clown
• the know-how transmission, whether it is through the continuing education of the clowns at Le Rire Médecin or the training offered more generally to artists and caregivers
• the evaluation of our programs impacts through research projects and scientific publishing

Le Rire Médecin continues to work with hospitalized children and their families always in close cooperation with the care teams.

If you would like to join this beautiful sporting and solidarity epic, join us on our dedicated website lesdefisdusourire.leriremedecin.org

Thanks to your support, even more children will benefit from our action ! For more information, visit us at www.leriremedecin.org

Contacts
Solidarity races : Emilie PEINCH e.peinch@leriremedecin.org / +33 (0)1 44 84 40 92
Institutionnel : Clotilde MALLARD c.mallard@leriremedecin.org / +33 (0)1 44 84 40 90

A fiscal receipt is issued for each donation. If you are an individual, you benefit from a tax on revenue reduction of 66% of your donation (within the annual limit of 20% of your taxable net income), and if you represent a company,a  company  tax reduction of  60 % of its amount (within the limits of 5 for each thousand of the turnover before tax).