1. Who are we? We are 15 amateur artists named Doctors of Folly who do fun activities in the paediatric wards of some hospitals in Santos, such as Santa Casa de Santos and Hospital Municipal Arthur Domingues Pinto. Our activities are game- centered, which, through topics like Health Care, doctors, parents and ourselves establish a bond to improve the admission procedure and recovery of children and adolescents.

2. What are our goals?

•  to boost the humor and self-esteem of children
•  to reduce the anxiety aroused by a possible admission into hospital and feeling of abandonment.
•  to teach, through games, subjects and procedures related to health care.
•  to arouse in parents the importance of their physical presence, care, follow up and orientation of their children during and after the admission.
•  To integrate the parents, medical team and children efforts in order to speed their recovery.

3. What are the main activities?

•  Continuous assistance, on weekends, in the pediatric ward of Santa Casa de Misericórdia Hospital in Santos, where our group has the infra-structure (a room and a computer) to develop our work.
•  Work in other hospital pediatric wards such as: Santa Casa in Praia Grande, Guilherme Álvaro in Santos, Hospital Modelo in Cubatão and São José on scheduled times.
•  Participation in campaigns, such as: vaccination, blood donation, collecting winter clothes for poor people, etc.
•  Lectures in schools, universities and other events to promote this voluntary work and involve more people in our program.

4. What is the methodology applied in this project?

•  There are specific methodologies to get more sponsorship patterns to present our work to associations and target organizations, to prepare new activities, to get new participants and to execute and perform the activity itself. This is the methodology related to our activity.

Indoor Performances

1. To prepare and improve, through artistic performances such as singing, dancing, acting and muppet shows, topics connected with children and adolescents.
2. To obtain permission from the hospitals to perform the tasks above mentioned
3. To check the number of children admitted to the hospital, as well as the number of rooms available and any other pertinent situation. If the hospital has already done or received any similar work, evaluate such work and make necessary changes if need be.
4. To have a light approach to children in order to gain their trust.
5. To introduce the Doctors of Joy to children.
6. To play games with children in which members of Doctors of Joy perform in a numerous way the role of doctors examining the kids. .
7. Distribute presents which have been donated by the local community.
8. To send letters to kids after they have been discharged from the hospital.

Outside Performance.

1. To connect institutions that work with public health campaigns.
2. To relate the performances to the purpose of the campaigns
3. To perform in campaigns such as Donating Blood means Saving Live, vaccination campaigns, etc.
4. To offer training courses for volunteers in order to find out what is more important for each individual in society.
5. To set up the project and enable the 3 rd Sector (charity) to participate in social events of the community.
6. To help in the training of volunteers and stimulate more social, health, cultural and educational campaigns, whose aim is to improve the quality of life in the community.
7. To promote activities such as body expression and relaxation.
8. To provide solutions to projects in progress in various areas of society.
9. To make use of colour and music therapy based on the influence of colours and music which affect human emotions and sensations.
10.   To organize drama groups in order to promote inner growth.

5. What´s the connection between this initiative and the other non-governmental organizations and the government?

- The Ronald MC Donald Institute is cooperating with MC Happy Day, whose money collected on the day of this event helps fight juvenile cancer. In this respect an Oncologic Pediatric Ward (2E) will shortly be inaugurated at Santa Casa de Santos.

- The Brazilian Red Cross participates in the City Watch Project, whose events try to raise awareness of the risks of skin cancer. For this, groups of citizens walk regularly along the beach singing the song of Doctors of Joy, putting identification bracelets on kids and counseling beach goers on procedures to avoid skin cancer.

- SESC Santos takes part in the social calendar that covers a number of non-governmental organizations that exchange life-experiences with the local community. SESC partakes in events such as citizenship week, women´s week, the exhibition of NASA photos on abortion, among other events all year long.

- The Santos Social Solidarity Fund - a partnership which has helped various entities and our society in our most pressing needs!

6. How does the community participate?

The community directly takes part in the Project. The group´s activities are held through small funding and contributions made by some companies. Balloons, balls, comics and thousands of other gifts are given by the community. Children also take part. An eleven year-old girl does colourful origami and sends them to hospitals and campaigns. The government, the media and the community have a vital role in large scale events.

7. What are the quantitative and qualitative results achieved?

Since the group´s beginning in 1997, it has helped more than 79.800 children and adolescents in hospitals. During the campaigns these figures have risen to 42.000 children.

The group annually helps 5.552 children (up to 6 years old ) and 5.588 children and adolescents (between 7 and 18 years old) at Hospital Municipal Arthur Domingues Pinto and Santa Casa de Misericórdia de Santos. From the quantitative point of view, there are surprising testimonies such as the one made by Jessica Pereira Lopes, 12 , who said: "I enjoy the hospital. I´ve been here for 76 days. I don´t hate it. People here are really nice. I spend the whole day riding my wheel-chair. For me I´m on vacations. It is as if I have been to a hotel."

8. Who are the most important partners in this project?

5 à Sec;
A Tribuna
AGV;
Associação Comunidade Mãos Dadas (ACMD);
Casa Branca Idiomas;
Cruz Vermelha Brasileira;
Fundo Social de Solidariedade de Santos;
Laboratório Pasteur;
MKT Virtual;
Pastoral da Criança de Santos - Alimentação Enriquecida;
Secretaria Municipal de Saúde de Santos;

9. What about the strategies to keep and extend such an initiative.

It is possible to expand our initiative as we now have the necessary infra-structure to provide the selection and training of our volunteers as well as the documents required by the law in order to operate legally.
Reports are sent to the organizations with which we work. We have been able to increase the number of participants from 5, as the project originally started, to 15, not to mention the number of actions developed by us.

10. What can be done for this initiative to prosper?

At first our group helped, on permanent basis, one pediatric ward. Now there are five. Through activities such as logo, folders, the use of the internet and events our work has improved, enabling us to grow.

11 . What is the process of evaluating the initiative like?

From a quantitative point of view, the initiative can have its performance evaluated on a permanent basis. Reports on our performances are sent to hospitals and published on the internet. As for quality, support is sought through oral and written interaction.

The quality of our work has born some fruit. The figures we have show a change in children´s behaviour, which ranges from a passive one, resulting in anxiety to an active one, producing daily social interactions. It has been observed that children more readly accept hospital procedures such as tests and co-operate with the hospital team, thereby displaying a positive image of the time spent in hospitals.

12. Why this initiative?

It is a blueprint in the field of health problems in Brazil as it focus on what for us is the core of any health question: our heart. We believe that most diseases, if not all, arise not only from financial reasons or ignorance on how to lead a healthy life but mainly from lack of love among families. This group aims to go far beyond what money, food and clothes can offer. This group donates hearts and souls to children and adolescents in need. Love and a smile make a difference in today´s world and will always be an excellent remedy for any sickness.