Judith...
What an interesting article! A lot of what was said in it really makes sense
to me (uhhhhh... so I can tell it won't fly with the insurance companies)
<grin>
Thanks for sharing with us....
Barb Mallut
[log in to unmask]
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From: Parkinson's Information Exchange on behalf of Judith Richards
Sent: Friday, October 31, 1997 7:11 AM
To: Multiple recipients of list PARKINSN
Subject: (long) MUSIC HATH CHARMS TO SOOTHE THE SAVAGE BEAST
Music does more than soothe and charm. In the hands of music therapists,
it's a tool to heal body, mind and spirit.
By Rick Ansorge The Gazette (KRT)
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. - At a Colorado Springs, Colorado, nursing home, an
old man had sunk into dementia and despair.
"He cried constantly. All he could say was 'My mama and papa are
dead,"'
says Eula Moore, 84, an uncertified music therapist who has been visiting
nursing homes since 1980.
"I said, 'Mine are dead, too. Perhaps we'll see them before too long
in
heaven. What will we do when we get to heaven?"'
"We'll sing 'Hail, Hail, the Gang's All Here!"' exclaimed the man, who
proceeded to do just that.
"He didn't cry after that," Moore says. "He'd let go of this awful
feeling he had."
Colorado is home to two of the nation's best-known music-therapy
programs:one at Colorado State University in Fort Collins and one at the
Naropa
Institute in Boulder.
Operating on the premise that music is good medicine, both schools
offer
students a mix of music, music education and psychology so they can
practice their healing art in nursing homes, hospitals, hospices, rehab
units and special schools.
The music-therapy scene is certain to gain even more attention this
fall
with the publication of a new Book-of-the-Month selection: "The Mozart
Effect: Tapping the Power of Music to Heal the Body, Strengthen the Mind
and Unlock the Creative Spirit" (Avon). Author Don Campbell, founder of the
Boulder, Colo.-based Institute of Health, Music and Education, opens with a
dramatic account of how he shrank a potentially lethal blood clot in his
brain with songs, chants and drumming.
"Your own inner sound system - your ears, voice, and choice of music
or
self-generated sounds - is the most powerful healing medium available,"
Campbell writes.
Yet, Colorado is hardly a hotbed of music therapy. Of the 5,000
therapists registered by the Maryland-based National Association for Music
Therapy, only 76 live in Colorado, mostly in the Denver-Boulder area.
That leaves the field open to people like Moore. Part music lover, part
drill sergeant, she prides herself on her ability to register with patients
who haven't responded to psychotherapy, drugs or other conventional
treatments.
"Music and dance are healing," she says. "Extremely so."
Her success stories include a combat veteran whose war wounds left him
unable to speak or control his arms or legs. Intensive one-on-one therapy
couldn't restore him to normal, but it did enable him to regain some
control of his voice, arms and legs.
"He couldn't talk otherwise," Moore says. "But he learned to call
square
dances."
Laura Wilson, an uncertified Woodland Park, Colo., music therapist and
former rock band keyboardist, also witnesses such up- lifting changes.
Wilson, 31, who graduated with a CSU music-therapy degree in 1988, performs
an hourlong program at up to nine nursing homes a day. She is reluctant,
however, to call herself a healer.
"What is healing anyway, other than a word that gets thrown around a
lot?" she asks. "I tend to be a little more practical. My goal is to get the
residents active and see that they have a good time."
Still, administrators at Integrated Health Services/Pikes Peak
(Pikes Peak Manor) have nothing but praise for Laura Wilson's twice-weekly
performances
there.
"What she does elevates, enhances and helps maintain the residents,"
says administrator Kelly Everly.
Wilson starts by leading residents through stretches, then coaxes
them to sing along to such old favorites as "Put Another Nickel In" and "You
Are My
Sunshine." Then she plays a variety of CDs, including new age, classical
and rock albums - even the alternative band Primus.
Wilson works the crowd like a professional, making eye contact with
the
residents as she sings, struts and banters. Most of the residents,
including the Alzheimer's patients, appear alert, happy and bright-eyed.
Administrators agree the show is more than entertaining - it's therapeutic.
"It stimulates them," says activity director Cindy Baum. "Whether they're
alert or confused, they just seem to totally change."
William Davis, director of CSU's undergraduate music-therapy program,
yearns for the day when music therapy becomes a mainstream medical
practice.
"We know it works," he says. "Skillful therapists can do incredible
things."
An increasing body of research shows, however, that music therapy is
effective in treating a host of ailments. Studies have shown that it
improves coordination of stroke and Parkinson's disease patients, that it
enables women to forgo anesthesia during labor, and that it reduces
patients' pre-surgical jitters as well as the post-surgical need for
painkilling drugs.
Anecdotally, it's been shown to be effective for such conditions as
acute pain, allergies, arthritis, headaches, heart disease, hypertension and
even writer's block.
CSU researchers recently conducted a study of 10 stroke and
Parkinson's-disease patients who had difficulty walking. After listening to
rhythmic pulses for 30 minutes a day, the patients' cadence, stride and
foot placement were markedly better than those of patients who had not
received music therapy.
Michael Thaut, director of CSU's graduate-level music-therapy program,
believes the pulses helped reprogram the patients' damaged brains.
Since ancient times, healers have known that sound is powerful stuff.
Shamans of all cultures have used chanting, drumming and other sounds to
help heal the sick.
Only in recent decades, however, have researchers discovered the
power of music. It's the first outside sensation that registers with a
developing
fetus, and the last that registers with a dying patient.
Throughout life, sound has the ability to both positively and
negatively
affect our physical and emotional well-being. It even affects the bodily
functions that we think are beyond our control, including heart rate, blood
pressure, sex drive and the release of the body's natural painkilling
chemicals.
Still, Davis admits that more research is needed to convince skeptical
doctors that music therapy is valid. "We can say we have some evidence," he
says. "But it's just not enough. There's still a misconception that all we
do is teach music to handicapped people."
Davis also is eager to convince health insurers that music therapy is
worthy of coverage. In most of the nation, music therapy is not a
reimbursable service. One of the few exceptions is Medicare, which will
reimburse under certain conditions of its partial-hospitalization policy.
"That's the key for us to continue to grow and be accepted," he says. "I
think it's going to happen in the next decade or so."
(c) 1997, The Gazette (Colorado Springs, Colo.).
Visit GT Online, the World Wide Web site of The Gazette, at
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