My little sister has disabilities and loves music. She loves to sing and just listen to a variety of songs all day long. She has experienced a myriad of therapies, which all help, but the one I found most interesting was music therapy. It’s not even just used for children with disabilities, but with children who are extremely ill. For example, in one of the THON movies, one of the children with cancer is in the hospital receiving music therapy from the therapist right in his room. I never realized what about music therapy helps an individual so i decided to look into it.

Music therapy is growing now more than ever, but actually goes all the way back to World Wars I and II when nurses would sing to their injured solider patients. CNN posted an article called “When Patients Have Music Emergencies” by Elizabeth Landau, and this is an excerpt from the article with the subtitle “Why It Works”:

“There is scientific research to back up the idea that music has healing properties. A 2013 analysis by Daniel Levitin, a prominent psychologist who studies the neuroscience of music at McGill University in Montreal, and his colleagues highlighted a variety of evidence: for instance, one study showed music’s anti-anxiety properties, another found music was associated with higher levels of immunoglobin A, an antibody linked to immunity. The brain’s reward center responds to music — a brain structure called the striatum releases the chemical dopamine, associated with pleasure. Food and sex also have this effect. The dopamine rush could even be comparable to methamphetamines, Robert Zatorre, professor of neurology and neurosurgery at Montreal Neurological Institute, told CNN last year,” (Landau, 1).

Music therapy is calming and soothing for patients and can ease any form of anxiety. It brings a sense of happiness to an ill patient and even happiness to people with disabilities who have a hard time understanding the world around them. Brian Jantz, a music therapist, was also written about in this CNN article. He conducted an experiment proving music therapy works when one of  his four year old patients was nervous about an intense X-Ray. He played music the whole walk to the X-Ray room, during the X-Ray, and during the walk back. The young girl didn’t even notice the X-Ray happened because she was calmed and distracted by the music.

In my opinion, I find these techniques more helpful then giving a patient endless amounts of medicine. If we can find alternatives like these that don’t require tons of medicines and needles, we should use them more often. My sister goes to speech therapy, occupational therapy, and music therapy. She always tells me music therapy is her favorite and she loves attending. I find that making a patient happy and distracting them from their problem can be one of the biggest aids when trying to overcome their obstacle.

Sources:

1.) http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/23/health/music-therapy/