Cancer patients will take the stage for a night of stand-up comedy in Santa Monica

SANTA MONICA, Calif. (KABC) -- What's scarier than learning you have cancer? How about going on stage and telling jokes about it? A unique program is transforming cancer patients into comedians all for a good cause.

Cancer and comedy are two words that don't usually add up. But for local comedian Nicole Blaine, humor equals healing.

"It ends up becoming a vessel for an entire group of people in a room to feel I can survive. I can get through this," Blaine said.

At the soul of comedy, Blaine says, is storytelling. That's why she founded The Crow comedy club in Santa Monica. She wanted a safe place to share stories.

"The American Cancer Society came up to me and said, 'Could we do something together?' And I said, 'Absolutely, and I also teach classes.' And then we both kind of cracked the code and developed 'Storyectomy,'" said Blaine.

"Storyectomy is basically a made up word," said family physician Dr. Manali Shendrikar, but part of this word is rooted in medicine.

"Ectomy means you remove something, or you garnish it from another being, you know. You take it out," she said.

That release can help your body heal.

"If you can make light of it, it actually helps the serotonin, the hormones in your brain. It helps. You feel so much better about what you're going through, because you're also sharing your experience," Shendrikar said.

Blaine's six-week comedy course is free to cancer survivors, thrivers and caregivers thanks to the diagnostic imaging firm, Radnet. Turning your trauma into triumph in front of a room full of strangers might sound terrifying, but Blaine says it's mostly therapeutic.

"The people in the class, we're crying. And we're laughing every week together. And then they bond and they heal. They get so much from each other and that ends up being part of the entire beauty of this process," Blaine said.

The first "Storyectomy" will have students take to the stage on August 4 at The Crow in Santa Monica. All proceeds from the show benefit the American Cancer Society.