Alumni Association Home > Past Issues > 2006 > November-December 2006	Print View

It’s Tuesday afternoon, and while the upper floors of the University of Minnesota Children’s Hospital, Fairview, buzz with medical staff taking care of their young patients, nurse Lori Hanson is in the basement scrambling to pull a bear hand puppet onto her arm.

“Two minutes!” the director yells, prompting Hanson to hunker down behind a tree-house backdrop. And Kids Club TV is on the air.

Broadcast weekly on closed-circuit television at the hospital, Kids Club transports hospitalized patients to a magical tree house filled with talking puppets, music, and storytelling. For Hanson (B.S. ’79, M.S. ’89), working on the interactive call-in show is the best part of her job. “For a half-hour, these kids get to goof off and do kid stuff,” she says.

Hanson, whose degrees are in nursing but who studied theater at the University as well, also co-hosts a weekly TV game show at the hospital, assisted by a young patient who has volunteered for the role. The backdrop is a bright blue curtain bedecked with a string of lights and colorful banners. During the show, kids participate in a wide array of games, either in the studio or via telephone from their hospital rooms.

Though the shows are full of fun, they also include genuine, no-nonsense discussion of illness and recovery. The children who participate in the hospital’s programming exude wisdom and maturity well beyond their years. A video camera is available on each floor for patients, with the help of staff or family, to make their own videos to air on the network. One youngster made a video showing how the dressing on his wound was changed; another girl with cystic fibrosis demonstrated the vest she wears to keep her air passages clear. A child undergoing chemotherapy called in to the program to tell about losing her hair, which prompted another viewer to call and describe how she’d been through that herself and to offer encouragement.

“Kids get to see they’re not the only ones going through what they’re going through,” Hanson explains.

Recently, Hanson co-hosted the show with Stephanie, a 14-year-old girl who has spent a lot of time at the hospital over the years. She was initially eager to participate but now, under the bright studio lights, seems to be getting cold feet. She looks down at the table and answers Hanson’s questions almost inaudibly. Meanwhile, off camera, a volunteer blows bubbles across the set to lighten the atmosphere.

The first challenge to the viewing audience (the hospital has 207 beds) is to correct the lyrics of well-known songs. Hanson starts singing a rousing “All You Need Is Macaroni” to the tune of the Beatles’ “All You Need Is Love.” Stephanie cracks a smile and even giggles. A girl with a lisp and a soft voice phones in with the correct title. Stephanie recognizes the voice and says excitedly, “Hey! That’s my roommate! Hi!”

The caller is a winner, and canned applause and cheering follow. “The kids really get into it,” says Tim Knaeble (B.S. ’80), manager of Child-Family Life Services at the hospital and executive producer of the shows. “Once a child told his doctor to come back after the show.”

The hospital’s closed-circuit programming dates back to the mid-1980s, when the broadcasts primarily focused on educating patients about diseases and treatments. In 1988, the hospital launched the Children’s Television Network, which introduced kids to the hospital and offered child-friendly movies. Kids Club debuted in 1993, and the hospital added The Game Show a year later.

The shows are broadcast live from a humble space in the Mayo Building that, at times in the past, served as a storage room and radiology lab. Produced on a shoestring budget, “the shows definitely have a homemade look and feel to them,” says Wes Bue (B.A. ’88), director of the shows. With a budget of only about $400 an episode, the staff and crew have to be inventive. Some set pieces came from the University warehouse, and virtually no money is spent on props.

Nor does the tight budget allow for rehearsals. But Hanson and Knaeble are good at winging it, having worked together on the shows for eight years. Plus, since the programs are interactive, the kids themselves are an integral part of each program. And the kids are never shy about calling in. “It’s live television and it’s kids, so you never really know what’s going to happen,” says Hanson, laughing.

And there’s televised bingo. Bingo is a patient favorite, and Hanson says it’s not uncommon for kids going into surgery or undergoing procedures to have someone play their cards for them. Instead of numbers and letters, the cards display pictures of things around the hospital that they’ll match with those displayed on the screen. These are items with which the kids are doubtlessly familiar: X-rays, stethoscopes, bandages, even the gazebo in the pavilion area just outside the hospital. Not long into the game, the first winner calls in and several follow shortly after. Volunteers record each patient’s name and room number so prizes can be delivered later. Says director Bue, “I love hearing the squeals of delight over the phone when a child gets a ‘bingo’ or wins a prize in some other way.”

While the official goals of the Children’s Television network include enhancing patients’ sense of safety and comfort while they’re hospitalized, encouraging socialization, and fostering empowerment, the actual effect of the programming is much more widely felt.

If there can be anything good about coming to the hospital for her ongoing dialysis, Annika’s favorite thing is Kids Club. The 8-year-old is awaiting a kidney transplant, and during her hospital stays, Annika has participated in both The Game Show and Kids Club. She’s been a news anchor on Kids Club, phoning in the news from her hospital room, and is proud to have won many times at bingo.

Not long ago, Annika sent her stuffed animal collection to the studio and then called into Kids Club from her hospital bed to introduce the animals over the air to other kids at the hospital. While Knaeble strummed his guitar and answered the tree-house phone, a tin can on string, Annika described her menagerie of stuffed owls, lions, and seals displayed on camera. There was, however, one piece of information she withheld. Annika has discovered, her mom says, that the location of the dialysis machine in the hospital makes it one of the first stops for the prize cart. This has greatly supplemented her stuffed animal collection. “I’ve probably got a hundred,” Annika says, grinning from her hospital bed, where school books, folders, and papers are strewn around her.

Because patients often miss a lot of school, the Children’s Television Network shows sometimes have an educational component as well. “It’s important to keep their minds engaged and include some mental stimulation in the programs,” Hanson explains. Guests from 3M and the University of Minnesota’s Raptor Center have presented segments in the programs. Jennifer Menken (B.S. ’94), a Fisheries and Wildlife graduate on the Bell Museum staff, makes a regular appearance on Kids Club. She brings with her objects from the museum: bones, seeds, feathers, and, occasionally, live animals. “Naturally, the animals are always a big hit,” she says.

Often, hospital staff members will do show-and-tell segments. Once, an anesthesiologist and a respiratory therapist demonstrated the tools of their trades and showed what they do at the hospital. “We always try to keep in mind that this is a child, not just a patient,” Knaeble says. “And the more they know about what goes on in the hospital, the less anxious they are—they have some mastery of the situation.”

Child-Family Life Services staff make the rounds to patients’ rooms, reminding everyone that Kids Club is about to air and distributing postcards for the children to fill out. The postcards are then collected and read on the air during “Tre-Mail,” a segment in which Knaeble and Hanson share the greetings and get-well wishes the young patients have written to each other on the postcards.

“Since so many kids are isolated and have to stay in their rooms,” Hanson says, “this is a great way for them to connect and feel like they’re part of something.”

On a recent Thursday, Benjamin is the “Kid of the Day,” another feature on Kids Club. He’s made a music video in which he is singing at the top of his lungs along with a popular song. He break-dances on the floor of the hospital playroom and shakes his booty so much he can barely keep up with himself. The studio crew laughs affectionately to see Benjamin throw his heart and soul—and body—into his video.

The broadcast wraps up with several kids phoning in to wish each other well over the air, and after “Happy Birthday” has been sung to all the patients with a birthday that week, Knaeble pulls out a well-worn copy of Stupid Jokes for Kids and reads a few gems.

“What do you call a jacket that goes up in flames? . . . A blazer!”

“What do you do when your nose goes on strike?”

Buddy Bear plays the foil: “I don’t know—what?”

“Picket!” Knaeble says, and then seems to have caught himself off-guard with the punch line. “Oh! Hey, can we say that?”

Somewhere, up on the floors of the hospital, an audience of young patients is taking a hearty dose of laughter, their favorite medicine.

Mary Jo Pehl is a Minneapolis-based freelance writer.