Our hospital visits sit at the heart of our services. In 2024/25 our team of professional artists and entertainers including musicians, magicians, poets, fairies, face-painters, therapy dogs and children’s characters will make more than 13,018 bedside visits across all our NHS hospital and hospice partners.
- In-person entertainer visits – A schedule of regular hospital visits to all our NHS London partners enables our artists, fairies, musicians, magicians, poets, face-painters, storytellers and therapy dogs to make one-to-one bedside visits to hundreds of children and teenagers every month. We also organise group visits and bespoke parties for special occasions
- Virtual visits – We run a varied schedule of one-to-one and group virtual visits for children and their siblings to enjoy. These can be enjoyed from hospital or at home and include arts and crafts, fairy sessions, singing, magic, story telling and so much more
- Smile TV – Our own free to view 24/7 channel featuring pre-recorded entertainment, shows, interviews and tutorials from our entertainers, partners and celebrities
- Bespoke referrals and Smile Parties – Personalised visits for individual children and teenagers to mark a milestone in their treatment, to help celebrate a birthday or special occasion or to support them and their families through palliative or end of life care.
A report published in the British Medical Journal in December 2020 found that “children and teenagers receiving treatment for acute or chronic conditions improve physically and emotionally after positive interactions that make them laugh and smile – leading a reduction in stress, fatigue, pain and distress.” This underlines our own research, which highlighted how our visits boost children even ‘at their lowest’ medical state and in their ‘darkest’ place and describes our services as a ‘lifeline’.
