Frank Chindamo the Founder & CEO of LaughMD, sure knows a thing or two about comedy and the power of humor.
Frank’s comedy career resume is a riot. He’s been a writer for SNL, worked on Ghostbusters, and has garnered some 30+ awards for writing and producing comedy videos for HBO, Showtime, CBS, PBS, Comedy Central and more. In addition, he’s a certified humor professional as part of the Association of Applied and Therapeutic Humor.
Frank launched LaughMD, the world’s’ first mobile comedy channel and it’s a huge hit with patients and health care workers in hospitals and health facilities around the country. LaughMD iPads are a digital therapeutic healing tool.
LaughMD Has PROOF They’re The Best Medicine!
SERIOUSLY.
500 scientific studies show positive health benefits of humor and laughter. If you saw the movie Patch Adams with Robin Williams, you’ll understand why the real Patch Adams is on Franks’ LaughMD advisory board. Dr. Patch Adams is a medical doctor and a clown who has devoted over 40 years of his life to changing America’s healthcare system and has traveled the world sharing his message that laughter, joy and creativity are an integral part of the healing process.
Health care providers and patients are raving how the LaughMD content is lowering their stress and pain. No joke!
Franks says, when you laugh your breathing gets better, your heart rate slows, your blood pressure goes down, all kinds of things happen to you when you laugh, all kinds of good things! Your endorphins, your serotonin, your dopamine go up, your cortisol and your adrenaline go down. So, you feel less pain and you are in a better mood and so that promotes healing. You heal more quickly, literally.
Frank also says, the nurses love it too, because their job is so incredibly stressful that according to National Public Radio about half of them are going to be planning on leaving the profession in the next two years because there’s so much stress.
They don’t have to convince me. I’m positive my sense of humor is what got me through my own 2 bouts of cancer. My favorite line I used every time I arrived for chemo treatment wearing a wig was, “Hi I’m here for the modeling assignment.”
I ‘get’ and wholeheartedly support Frank Chindamo and LaughMD.
Frank says, “Ask your doctors, ask your health officials, ask your hospitals to please subscribe because we don’t sell to the public, we sell to the institutions, health care institutions, dialysis, cancer clinics, drug and alcohol recovery, that sort of thing. Those are our customers. So if you work there, please, my phone number is on the website and if you’re a customer there, even better.”
Right now LaughMD is an app but they’re raising funding so that they can do it in virtual reality, and hook up with medical devices so people can see their biometrics change in real time.
Tune in to this podcast of our live conversation on The Debbie Nigro Show and meet Frank Chindamo and help spread the word to other healthcare facilities about the healing power of LaughMD.
If You’d rather read than listen the audio transcript is below .
AUDIO TRANSCRIPT
0:00:00
It’s time for the Debbie Nigro Show with Debbie Nigro, who says she’s still a babe, or at least she thinks she still is. That’s right, attitude is everything, and Debbie’s delusionally young. No one sees the glass of Cabernet half full like Debbie. She’s fresh air with a magnetic flair. Some day has arrived, and as far as she’s concerned, it’s time to roll.
0:00:30
Any morning you can wake up and have another laugh is a good morning.
7
0:00:33
Hi, everybody. I’m Debbie Nigro.
1
0:00:35
Oh, I got a good laugh today with the from the Benedict Arnold School of Medicine forget those 10,000 steps Here’s how much science says you actually need to walk. I hate that It’s always like they tell you to do something you think oh my gosh How am I gonna do this and they go? Oh, we’re only kidding anyway kidding laughing big subject today on the wellness version of the Debbie Nigro show I’m very excited about my guest I’m about to introduce you to because I am a huge proponent of humor as a healing tool. I have proven this in real time in my own life, having survived cancer twice. What comes to mind is how I used to arrive for my chemo appointments wearing a wig, and I’d walk right up to the receptionist and straight face and say, hey, I’m here for the modeling assignment. They’d look at me like, what? Okay, baby, you got to do it this way. Anyway, I found this guy. Oh my gosh is he cool as hell Frank Chindamo. He founded and is the CEO of an organization called laugh MD and they are proving To be the best medicine in hospitals around the country Frank is a pretty special comedian Listen to what his career includes writing for Saturday Night Live working on Ghostbusters. He’s got 30 plus awards for writing and producing comedy for HBO, Showtime, CBS, PBS, Comedy Central and more. And this is his creation, his invention, his idea, the first mobile comedy channel. Okay, he’s got these iPads that are in there, a healing hit. And we’ll talk about the science behind this. Who’s involved, and you might find this fascinating as well if you’ve seen the movie with Robin Williams where he plays dr. Patch Adams well, dr. Patch Adams the real guy is on the advisory board for laughs MD He’s proven over 40 years of his career that you know joy and laughter and creativity are integral to the healing process so without further ado Say hello to the the founder of laughs MD Frank Cendano. Hey Frank!
2
0:02:53
Hi Debbie, how you doing?
1
0:02:56
I’m so happy to have you.
2
0:02:58
Well you certainly did your homework. My gosh, my mother doesn’t even know all that stuff.
1
0:03:04
Hey Frank, I am somebody’s mother, so I did my homework for your mother. Okay, that’s how we do it over here. What’s happening in your world today out there in California. Everybody laughing? Well you know it’s just 8 in the morning here
2
0:03:17
so people are pouring coffee and wishing they were back in bed. Not me mind you. Of course
1
0:03:24
not me. No, not you, not you. You really came up with something and I want to talk about the science behind our joking around about this serious subject right now. 500 scientific studies have shown positive health benefits of humor and laughter. So this is not some joke.
7
0:03:44
No, that’s your job. You make the jokes.
1
0:03:46
Laugh MD, you’re the laugh doctor. Don’t you actually have a certification in this field? I do, actually. I’m a certified humor professional as part of the Association of Applied and Therapeutic Humor,
2
0:04:07
which is super nerdy.
1
0:04:11
And you have some other nerds with you. What a board management team you have. Beautiful people who, as I was reading about each one of them, Joshua Berman and Victor Tetralt and Michael Citrin and Terrence Hines and David Groves and Patch Adams, your advisor, and Cynthia Shelby, and Jeffrey Gurian, who’s a friend of mine, Craig Shoemaker, Paul Jacobson, Dr. Joshua Cohen, and board of directors, I mean, my gosh, Sandra Kufau, Professor Frank Chindamo, Michael Citrin, all really smart, smart, educated people who know they are supporting something that is absolutely the best medicine for people to heal themselves, laughter and joy. You want to talk about what you’ve seen in the world that you’ve entered with this, the hospitals, the health care workers? Well it’s funny
2
0:04:57
because whenever I offer this to nurses, the nurses love it because their job is so incredibly stressful that according to National Public Radio about half of them are going to be planning on leaving the profession in the next two years because there’s so much stress
1
0:05:16
for jobs. Yep, yes, yes, I talked I had a nurse in here talking about how terrible the industry is now because nobody wants to be a nurse anymore it’s just it’s it’s a problem it’s a huge problem with everybody just went through with the frontline workers and it was traumatizing right so what is it you’re exactly selling to these hospitals health care facilities oncology units, you know, all the places that would need help raising spirits of both healthcare workers and patients. It’s an iPad? Is it the programming? What are you offering?
2
0:05:51
So what we do is, you know, consider it a channel, right? And we collate, we curate and we vet as many comedy videos as we can possibly find. Right now we’ve got about 6,000 that are on the app and we’re going up to about 30,000. And we make sure that the comedy that we put on there is positive, that it is clean, that it’s inoffensive, that it’s not political, and it’s just, you know, kind of good, clean fun, like babies laughing or cats falling off a chair and things like that. But we also have SNL. We’ve also got Seinfeld. We’ve also got Pranks and Stunts, vlogs, things like that. Jeffrey Gurian, as you said, is on that channel. He’s got two different playlists on LaughMD, as a matter of fact.
1
0:06:47
Awesome. So, I have been in the hospital. Anybody who’s been in the hospital, you know the one thing you’re hoping for is that your television works, right? That you can hook it up while you’re laying there in bed and that’s like a big deal, like that they often don’t work, which is insane. So you are talking about programming and I read something about the LaughMD iPads. Can patients get iPads or are you recommending they bring their own phones or iPads and then just hook onto your channel? How do they get your channel?
2
0:07:16
So it is an app right now. We’re raising funding so that we can do it in virtual reality, so that we can hook up with medical devices so that you can see your biometrics change in real time.
1
0:07:32
Really?
2
0:07:32
Because that’s what happens.
1
0:07:34
Yeah.
2
0:07:35
Is that your breathing gets better, your heart rate slows, your blood pressure goes down, all kinds of things happen to you when you laugh, all kinds of good things, I should say. Your endorphins, your serotonin, your dopamine go up, your cortisol and your adrenaline go down. So you feel less pain and you are in a better mood and so that promotes healing. You heal more quickly, literally.
1
0:08:05
So laughter is the best medicine, it’s not a joke, it’s a real statement and you’re taking it to the level of actually integrating it into patients’ lives and caretakers’ lives and caregivers’ lives. I was reading about how many patients felt like they weren’t in as much pain anymore after watching your channel. That’s crazy.
2
0:08:26
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, we I was a an adjunct professor at USC and then I started doing this with them at the Norris Cancer Center. Thanks to an amazing Dr. Jacek Pinsky. And we have found that in the we did two studies at USC and in one of them, 91% of the patients who were experiencing pain said that this lowered their pain levels.
1
0:08:53
Unbelievable.
2
0:08:55
And then…
1
0:08:56
Better than aspirin. Better than aspirin. And then the care… you did something with the caregivers and nurses, a giant percentage, like 94 or 5% of them who had been very stressed out, who took a little time to watch this, felt like, wow, the stress had left them. Absolutely.
5
0:09:11
Is that what I’m hearing?
6
0:09:12
Amazing.
2
0:09:13
Yes. Absolutely. 96% said that it lowered their stress.
1
0:09:17
Unbelievable. I can talk to you all day long. I know you had only a little bit of time, so I gave you the first segment here. LaughMD.com. You’re going to read about Professor Frank Chindamo, who’s a doll and funny as hell, and behind this whole thing. And what do you want people to do before you say goodbye? What should everybody listening do?
2
0:09:36
Ask your doctors, ask your health officials, ask your hospitals to please subscribe because we don’t sell to the public, we sell to the institutions, health care institutions, dialysis, cancer clinics, drug and alcohol recovery, that sort of thing. Those are our customers. So if you work there, please, my phone number is on the website and if you’re a customer there, even better. That’s a lot of times that we get into these facilities.
1
0:10:04
Alright, we’re out of time, but I’m going to help promote you. We’re friends for life. Onward.
2
0:10:09
Thank you, Debbie. You’re a funny, funny lady. Thank you so much.
