Monday Music Notes

I had a lady come up to me today after my choir concert and share that she had a young daughter who has autism.  She asked me if I had ever heard of a certain school in the area that specializes in students with developmental disabilities.  I told her about my choir program for the older students.  (I conducted a pilot program creating a choir with three classrooms, which serve older students.)  She smiled and said her daughter loved music and wondered how she could get music therapy.  I shared some information with her on how to contact the company I work for and see if her daughter could receive individual services.  I truly hope she will follow up since she smiled as she told me what happens when her daughter hears music.

You may have heard about music therapy for individuals or groups, but have you ever wondered if music therapy could work for families? Michael Silverman’s article “Effects of Family-Based Educational Music Therapy on Acute Psychiatric Patients and their Family Member: An Exploratory Mixed-Methods Study,” explores music therapy in a family based setting for psychiatric patients. As the length of inpatient psychiatric stays are decreasing, the care and support provided by families for their loved ones are increasing. Education groups and therapy groups have been successful for families struggling with a mental health diagnosis of a loved one. These types of education groups, or psychoeducation, groups can help decrease stressors involving communication, interactions, and coping within the family environment.  

Almost everyone has seen a baby light up when listening to or experiencing music. Ever wonder if recorded music or live music is better for babies? Grunkstiene, Buinauskiene, Uloziene, and Markuniene looked into the effects of live and recorded music on stable, premature babies. Preterm infants are sensitive and can be overstimulated easily. Music is a way to appropriately stimulate these infants in a safe way. This can help stimulate healthy development and improve their vitals (such as heart rate and oxygen levels) while also decreasing stress or pain during procedures. When vitals are improves and stress is decreased, the infant has more energy to grow and mature.

This article outlines a case study performed by researchers to find the effect of using embedded song interventions compared to verbal instruction of a 5-year-old boy diagnosed with Autism. The researchers noted that in our culture independence is highly valued by young individuals as well as for adults who provide care for them. For children with Autism, independent self-care can be inhibited by a number of factors such as motivation and meaning to the individual, habits and performance patterns, communication deficits, sensory processing, and variability of performance. These factors can lead to adults parenting or working with children with Autism maintaining their caregiver role during self-care tasks for longer periods of time than those working with typically developing children.

As a Music Therapist and a Music Educator, I find myself drawn to articles written by music educators concerning students with disabilities in their classroom.  Although music therapy is a related service under IDEA, many school districts do not employ music therapists to work with their special needs students.  Often music educators are left to grapple with the how to teach these students with varying levels of training and experience.

Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) have many challenges.  Most of us think about their awkwardness in social settings.  Those with severe ASD may not be able to talk or only communicate through an Augmentative & Alternative Communication (AAC) device.  Some use Ipads, which have special applications that assist with communication.

Most consider the survey as one of the best ways to determine what trends are developing and how professionals deal with change.  Knowing that the public, professionals and families focus much attention on Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), researchers asked what clinical practices and training needs exist for music therapists working with this specific population.  Most recently, media releases say that 1 in 88 individuals (different statistics for males versus females) receive a diagnosis of ASD.  Kern, Rivera, Chandler and Humpal (2013) took the opportunity to ask 328 professional music therapists from the American Music Therapy Association questions regarding their involvement in working with individuals diagnosed with this disorder.  Researchers needed to find out how many worked with individuals with ASD, but wanted them to answer questions about assessment, clinical goals, approaches and techniques used to treat these individuals.  Examining these key areas helps “evaluate the status of music therapy practices…, the implementation of national ASD standards and guidelines, the awareness of recent developments and training needs of music therapists” (p. 274).

As a music therapist, my job is to make sure that my client/patient can participate in music making, as this is often one of the main goals of my sessions.  Neuroscience research is showing us just how active the brain is when an individual is participating in the music making process.   Those that attend a concert and see music presented are not as involved as those participating.  Music educator Matthew D. Thibeault stated in his article entitled “Music Education for All through Participatory Ensembles” which makes a valid point for music educators to create ensembles for everyone because participation maximizes enjoyment and focus.

Quality of life has become more and more of a focus in care of individuals with Dementia. Many articles or studies have shown that music therapy can help quality of life for many people, but how exactly does it help individuals with varying levels of Dementia? In the study “Effect of Group Music Therapy on Quality of Life, Affect, and Participation in People with Varying Levels of Dementia”, researchers attempted to find out why music therapy is effective for Dementia.

Music can help soothe symptoms related to medical procedures or diagnoses, but can it help the deeper issues that come with a serious medical diagnosis? Potvin, Bradt, and Kesslick looked into symptoms management and the underlying issues in their research article, “Expanding Perspective on Music Therapy for Symptom Management in Cancer Care.”

Many adults suffer silently with chronic mental illness. In fact, according to The National  Institutes of Mental Health about 4.1% of the population suffer from serious, ongoing mental illness. Unfortunately the current health system focuses on stabilization of the most acute symptoms. However, in order to return to a functional daily life much more treatment is needed.  Music therapy, along with counseling, medication, and other treatments, can help ease symptoms of mental illness and assist in integrating these individuals into the community.

According to Webster’s online dictionary meta-analysis is a systematic review of the literature, which “involves pooling the data and using the pooled data to test the effectiveness of the results” (www.merriam-webster.com).  Researchers use this device to evaluate what research has been done on a particular subject or research question to ask if what is available helps answer the question or gives sufficient results to come to a conclusion.  Research on the subject of Autism Spectrum Disorders and the therapies that seek to help those with ASD are vast.  Srinivasan and Bhat (2013) wanted to discover what research explored music and movement therapies for children with ASD.  They found that so much literature exists regarding communication and social deficits, but found little on music and movement.