Rx Music

Music hath charms to soothe the savage breast....

It's not exactly a "future" story, because it's happening right now, but one of the trends I've been following for a number of years is music therapy.

The idea that music can heal (or at least facilitate healing in some way) is not new, but it still raises the eyebrows of high-brow practitioners.

The latest story to lower that skeptical scorn comes from Mattel Children's Hospital UCLA, thanks to the Music Rx Unit donated by the Children's Cancer Association.

The portable cart has instruments that young patients can play with, and interactive video for demonstrating various instruments. As patients, children participating in music therapy become more relaxed, their pain and anxiety are reduced, and they communicate and bond better with family and hospital staff.

The Music Rx program also includes live performances, filling hospital corridors with stress-reducing sounds. The program planners are also building a recording studio, further extending young patients' involvement in their own music therapy.

I hope adult patients aren't left out of the mix. When my parents were in hospital and nursing home situations, the only sounds they were exposed to were noisy carts and chattering staff, other patients' TV's turned on to Headline News (with the same headlines repeated all day long, repeatedly!), and nothing in the way of soothing sounds.

One day a volunteer musician visited the nursing home where my father was and went from room to room to play guitar and sing just one song for patients who couldn't get out to the great room. I saw my dad that afternoon, and the expression on his face was so light and childlike in its joy. He said I missed all the fun, and he started singing! That became one of the best memories I have of my dad in his declining years.

Music didn't heal him, but it certainly helped him.

love, hosaa
humming