People who experience a stroke often encounter enormous changes in every aspect of their lives. The result is often that a huge emotional and social adjustment is required to adapt to this change. Music therapy is being used as an effective therapy for stroke treatment as it can offer a supportive environment to help stroke survivors achieve greater health and well being in this time of great loss and change.
A key component of the intervention is the fact that music is used as a non-verbal means of communication. Thus, although the person’s communication may be impaired or perhaps their feelings are too painful to express in words, music can be the avenue to allow the person to connect to themselves and to others around them. Recent studies identify the positive benefits of music therapy in neuro-rehabilitation in the treatment for a stroke, specifically in the areas of emotional expression, memory, language, motor skills, cognition and mood. The field of music therapy is proving highly effective in various clinical areas, one of which is in rehabilitation settings following stroke. Current statistics from the Irish Heart Foundation reveal that stroke is the third most prominent fatal disease in Ireland – causing more deaths than breast cancer, prostate cancer and bowel cancer combined. On average, some 10,000 people suffer a stroke in Ireland each year. It is estimated that one in five people will have a stroke at some time in their life.
Neuroscientists have discovered that music stimulates functioning across both the left and right hemispheres of the brain, while specific areas of the brain control other functions, such as memory or visual processing. Music therapy has also been found to aid in the rehabilitation and treatment of a stroke, as it helps the patients’ physical movement and mobility. By using a variety of instruments, mainly percussion, the music therapist works towards increasing the patient’s range of gross and fine motor skills.
Music therapy has also been used in the recovery of verbal communication. As singing and speaking are neurologically different functions, people who have experienced a stroke can sometimes sing entire lyrics of songs, but may find it challenging to say the word ‘hello’. Singing can also be a motivating therapeutic medium for clients in neuro-rehabilitation, as singing exercises may not involve a conscious thought processing.
Many people who survive a stroke experience fear, grief, anger, frustration, anxiety and often a huge sense of loss for their physical and mental impairments. Music therapy has been successfully used as a therapy for a stroke patient as it can assist in the rebuilding of self identity and self esteem following emotional trauma, leading to an increase in the person’s motivation and overall well being. By building the patients’ positive emotional state and motivation, music therapy can speed up the rehabilitation process. Thus, music therapists can play an important role within a multi-disciplinary team. The growing amount of research shows how music therapy is an important part of modern healthcare, especially as an early intervention for people who have experienced a stroke.
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