Music and health: what interventions for what results?

摘要

For several decades, music has been used more and more frequently and consciously as a mean of care to reduce or stabilize symptoms and/or complications arising therefrom. This has been the case with several diseases, including chronic and degenerative ones (in psychiatry, child neuropsychiatry, neurology, oncology, palliative care, etc.) (Gold et al., 2004; Särkämö et al., 2008; Bradt et al., 2011; Erkkilä et al., 2011; Mössler et al., 2011; Raglio et al., 2012; Bradt and Dileo, 2014) and in contexts in which the symptoms are just momentary (e.g., in hospitals before surgical interventions in order to reduce anxiety and stress, or to reduce the perception of pain during invasive medical procedures) (Bradt et al., 2013; Cepeda et al., 2013). Indeed, music also gives pleasure, promotes well-being, facilitates the expression and regulation of emotions and improves communication and relationships between individuals (Hillecke et al., 2005). Numerous systematic reviews of the literature (including many Cochrane Reviews), randomized controlled or controlled clinical trials and qualitative studies, all show the significant results that come with the therapeutic use of music.