Happy Kids Heal Faster

At Starlight, we know that happy kids heal faster. 

A person’s mental and emotional health impacts their physical health and healing process —which is why all five Starlight programs are focused on delivering happiness. 

 But how do we know that our Starlight programs actually impact a child’s happiness? 

 We’ve established 10 criteria that we constantly use to evaluate our programs and ensure that we deliver as much happiness (and healing!) as possible. These include:  

• Play: Engages children through activities to help them learn, grow, and express themselves in an unfamiliar environment.

• Comfort: Offers physical, mental, or emotional relief to help alleviate feelings of distress and anxiety.

• Normalization: Provides activities kids enjoy in everyday life to help make an unfamiliar, scary place feel safe and fun.

• Entertainment: Provides children relief and distraction from stressful situations with enjoyable, amusing, educational, and stimulating content.

• Socialization: Provides a sense of community and belonging while reducing boredom and isolation.

Starlight Gaming is there to normalize the hospital experience by giving sick kids the opportunity to play video games, just like they would at home with their friends and family, while Starlight Virtual Reality gives them the chance to be completely immersed in a different world that allows them to “escape” the four walls of their hospital room.

Starlight Hospital Wear gives children a sense of comfort with its soft material, ties that go down the side instead of the back, and features some of their favorite characters and designs!

Starlight Spaces create places for children to play, socialize with their peers, and just be kids, while Starlight Deliveries provide toys, arts and crafts, and so many other activities for kids to do while they are stuck in their hospital room. We know how lonely and scary a hospital stay can be, so these activities are an important distraction! 

Our mission is to deliver happiness to seriously ill kids and their families because we know the impact that happiness can have on healing. 

 That’s why each of our programs is uniquely focused on creating moments of joy.