What is Music Therapy?

Music Therapy is the clinical and evidence-based use of music interventions to accomplish individualized goals within a therapeutic relationship by a credentialed professional who has completed an approved music therapy program.

Music therapy interventions can be designed to:

• Promote Wellness

• Manage Stress

• Alleviate Pain

• Express Feelings

• Enhance Memory

• Improve Communication

• Promote Physical Rehabilitation

Research in music therapy supports its effectiveness in a wide variety of healthcare and educational settings

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Music therapy is an established health profession in which music is used within a therapeutic relationship to address physical, emotional, cognitive, and social needs of individuals. After assessing the strengths and needs of each client, the qualified music therapist provides the indicated treatment including creating, singing, moving to, and/or listening to music. Through musical involvement in the therapeutic context, clients' abilities are strengthened and transferred to other areas of their lives. Music therapy also provides avenues for communication that can be helpful to those who find it difficult to express themselves in words. Research in music therapy supports its effectiveness in many areas such as: overall physical rehabilitation and facilitating movement, increasing people's motivation to become engaged in their treatment, providing emotional support for clients and their families, and providing an outlet for expression of feelings.

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To learn more visit:

https://www.musictherapy.org/

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Who can benefit from music therapy?

Veterans and non-vets suffering from PTSD, Anxiety, stress, cancer (oncology) patients, abused victims, substance abuse, autism, behavioral, grief, bereavement, chronic pain, developmentally disabled, eating disorders, Asperger's, comatose, head injury, hearing impaired, hospice, labor/delivery, mental health, disabled, neurological, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, speech impaired, stroke, terminally ill, visually impaired, physical and mental & emotional rehabilitation, geriatric, adult and child day care, community, correctional facility, universities and all schools.

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Music Therapy Research

Clinical research findings indicate:

• Music therapy is provided as integrated care and stand-alone treatment for PTSD to address behavioral health goals such as: promoting relaxation, informing mind body connections, emotional regulation, hyper-vigilance, and sleep.

• Music therapy in the treatment of TBI addresses cognition and memory, sustained/focused attention to task, divided attention/multitasking, problem-solving skills, speech and language, auditory processing (auditory perception and tolerance of auditory stimuli), motor control and response, and headaches.

• In collaboration with other treatment disciplines, music therapy contributes to improvements in articulation, task-attention, and compensatory strategies.

• Music therapy can enhance interpersonal communication, reduce isolation, and support familial bonding/social engagement.

• In collaboration with other treatment disciplines, music therapy contributes to improvements in range of motion, functional use of bilateral upper extremities, strength endurance, and breath support.

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The healing power of vibration

                   

At its core, music is sound, and sound is rooted in vibration. Led by Lee Bartel, PhD, a music professor at the University of Toronto, several researchers are exploring whether sound vibrations absorbed through the body can help ease the symptoms of Parkinson's disease, fibromyalgia and depression. Known as vibroacoustic therapy, the intervention involves using low frequency sound — similar to a low rumble — to produce vibrations that are applied directly to the body. During vibroacoustic therapy, the patient lies on a mat or bed or sits in a chair embedded with speakers that transmit vibrations at specific computer-generated frequencies that can be heard and felt, says Bartel. He likens the process to sitting on a subwoofer.

                   

In 2009, researchers led by Lauren K. King of the Sun Life Financial Movement Disorders Research and Rehabilitation Center at Wilfrid Laurier University, in Waterloo, Ontario, found that short-term use of vibroacoustic therapy with Parkinson's disease patients led to improvements in symptoms, including less rigidity and better walking speed with bigger steps and reduced tremors (Neuro-Rehabilitation, December, 2009). In that study, the scientists exposed 40 Parkinson's disease patients to low-frequency 30-hertz vibration for one minute, followed by a one-minute break. They then alternated the two for a total of 10 minutes. The researchers are now planning a long-term study of the use of vibroacoustic therapy with Parkinson's patients, as part of a new partnership with the University of Toronto's Music and Health Research laboratory, which brings together scientists from around the world who are studying music's effect on health.

                   

The group is also examining something called thalamocortical dysrhythmia — a disorientation of rhythmic brain activity involving the thalamus and the outer cortex that appears to play a role in several medical conditions including Parkinson's, fibromyalgia and possibly even Alzheimer's disease, says Bartel, who directs the co-laboratory.

                   

"Since the rhythmic pulses of music can drive and stabilize this disorientation, we believe that low-frequency sound might help with these conditions," Bartel says. He is leading a study using vibroacoustic therapy with patients with mild Alzheimer's disease. The hope is that using the therapy to restore normal communication among brain regions may allow for greater memory retrieval, he says.

                   

"We've already seen glimmers of hope in a case study with a patient who had just been diagnosed with the disorder," Bartel says. "After stimulating her with 40-hertz sound for 30 minutes three times a week for four weeks, she could recall the names of her grandchildren more easily, and her husband reported good improvement in her condition."

                   

The goal of all of this work is to develop "prescribable" music therapy and music as medicine protocols that serve specific neurological functions and attend to deficits that may result from many of these neurologically based conditions. Rather than viewing music only as a cultural phenomenon, Bartel says, the art should be seen as a vibratory stimulus that has cognitive and memory dimensions.

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