Although outwardly the operations of the hospital clowns look like a lot of foolery, it takes a great deal of organisation to keep the big clown shoes moving. To keep their operations in check, the Hospital Clowns Association acquired the Microsoft Office 365 package from Telia to help them.
When a child falls ill, the whole family focuses on their recovery and everyday life takes a back seat. A world filled with white coats, medical examinations and unpleasant procedures does not leave much room for a child to just be a child. Hospital clowns give young patients and their families something else to think about for a while and draw out children’s natural inclination to play.
“We think every child should have the right to fool around and laugh even in hospital and that’s why we have striven to extend our operations right from the start,” says Aino Viertola, General Manager of the Finnish Hospital Clowns Association. “Over the years, we have grown into a nationwide organisation that operates in all the university hospitals across the country. However, there’s still plenty of room to grow and expand. Our services are in great demand and many hospitals are considering involving our association’s hospital clowns more closely in the patient care team itself, in addition to just entertaining. Over the last few years, we have been involved with developing a new, more child-oriented form of treatment at hospitals.”
We think every child should have the right to fool around and laugh even in hospital and that’s why we have striven to extend our operations right from the start
For running and developing these clown activities, you need well-functioning processes and smooth information technology. That is why the team of three at the association’s office is working hard in the background, while its clown doctors cultivate a happy atmosphere in hospitals.
“Our work at the office is the complete opposite of what the clowns do – fund-raising, communications, budgeting and planning shift schedules. For managing all this, we need good, practical tools at the office and that’s why we chose the familiar, well-functioning Office 365 package,” Viertola explains.
“Office 365 is an affordable and handy service for us for organising the work needed to run our operations. Telia’s help desk has also been extremely useful to us. If we have problems with our emails, for example, we can trust Telia’s experts to fix them. We have been more than happy with the collaboration,” Viertola smiles.