Episode 35: Is Laughter Really the Best Medicine?

In the early 1300s, a surgeon to the king of France told other surgeons to have someone tell their patients jokes before an operation.

The saying itself goes back even further, to a line of Hebrew poetry in Proverbs about a merry heart and a broken spirit, and over the centuries it moved from a surgeon's bedside orders to a Reader's Digest joke column, then a Stanford researcher's blood samples and Norman Cousins's famous hotel room recovery.

This episode follows how a real observation about comfort got trimmed down into laughter yoga certifications, Patch Adams, and "Live Laugh Love" throw pillows, and what the science actually says laughing can do for your stress, your pain, and your body.