Tickling should be part of recovery when your in the hospital. I remember twice in the past I spent time in the hospital for knee surgery. The nurse came to me with this contraption to breathe into. I asked what for and she answered it was so the lungs more or less were exercised so prevent pneumonia , or something like that. I tried it once and I wasn't impressed ( you blow into a tube and make a small ball inside rise to a certain level and maintain it) .Anyway my then gf would visit me and ask about it and me being "too cool" to use such a dopey thing refused it so she put it on herself to exercise my lungs "her way" by tickling my feet! I wasn't in any pain from the surgery and my foot was pretty much immobile in traction so that was that. She tickled me through all commercial breaks on the tv that was on in the room. Nurse came in and saw what she was doing and said well if your not going to use the machine I suppose whatever it takes! lol. Depending on what one is in the hospital for tickling would definitely benefit a patient....a 10-15 minutes tickle twice a day..why not? if for nothing else if your in a hospital why not laugh a little! lol