Entrainment is the main reason that music during surgery works! In the process of entrainment, your bodies natural rhythms such as heart-rate and breathing, automatically synchronize with the pulse of music. In an everyday example, when you hear strongly rhythmic music such as high-energy disco music, rock-and-roll, or a Sousa march, you automatically start tapping your toe, bobbing your head or actually dancing! Research in music therapy has proven time and again that the body responds to music even when in a coma state or asleep. When you are under general anesthesia, you can still be tense, anxious and require the maximum safe dose of anesthesia. When you have slow, steady, soothing music coming into your brain through headphones, your body automatically relaxes and entrains with that music, thus allowing you to take the MINIMUM safe amount of anesthesia. My “Surgical Serenity Headphones” have only been on the market for 5 months, but already word is spreading and they are selling every day. If you are interested in using these for your surgery, but feel that you can’t afford them, contact me and I will work something out with you! To read more about them click here.
Why does entrainment work during surgery?
September 14th, 2009 · Music and Exercise, Music and Surgery, Music in the Hospital, Rhythmic Entrainment
Current Research documents benefits of music during pregnancy
September 12th, 2009 · Music with Newborns and Preemies, Music with Pregnancy and Childbirth, The Lullaby Effect
Current Research on Music Therapy during Pregnancy
Effects of music therapy on psychological health of women during pregnancy.
Chang MY, Chen CH, Huang KF.
National Tainan Institute of Nursing, Taiwan.
I think that most women know intuitively that listening certain kinds of music during pregnancy really calms them down, soothes and comforts them. And of course, it’s doubly powerful because when Mom calms down, baby calms down!
The following study just serves to further document what I’ve been saying for years now, “Music during pregnancy is a great way to calm yourself and your baby without ingesting potentially dangerous drugs and chemicals! Of course I highly recomment my own CD of “Lullabies for Mother – baby Bonding.” If you listen to this on a regular basis while you’re pregnant, the same tunes and melodies will calm and comfort baby after she’s born whether it’s played on CD or sung or hummed by mother. Baby loves HER mother’s voice, no matter what, because that’s the one she heard before birth!
Click Here to BUY my LULLUBY CD.
AIMS AND OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of music therapy on stress, anxiety and depression in Taiwanese pregnant women.
BACKGROUND: The value of music therapy is slowly being realized by nurses in various clinical areas, including obstetrics. Previous studies have demonstrated a high prevalence of psychological stress during pregnancy. Few studies have examined the effects of music therapy on reducing psychological stress during pregnancy.
DESIGN: A randomized experimental study design was developed and implemented.
METHODS: Two hundred and thirty-six pregnant women were randomly assigned to music therapy (n = 116) and control (n = 120) groups. The music therapy group received two weeks of music intervention. The control group received only general prenatal care. Psychological health was assessed using three self-report measures: Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), State Scale of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (S-STAI) and Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS).
RESULTS: In a paired t-test, the music therapy group showed significant decrease in PSS, S-STAI and EPDS after two weeks. The control group only showed a significant decrease in PSS after two weeks. This decrease was not as substantial as in the experimental group. An ancova test with the pretest scores as the control revealed that the changes in PSS, S-STAI and EPDS after two weeks were significantly decreased in the experimental group compared with the control group.
CONCLUSIONS: This controlled trial provides preliminary evidence that two-week music therapy during pregnancy provides quantifiable psychological benefits.
RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE: The findings can be used to encourage pregnant women to use this cost-effective method of music in their daily life to reduce their stress, anxiety and depression. Further research is needed to test the long-term benefits.
Benefits of Healing Music–Priceless!
September 12th, 2009 · Music and the Mind-Body, Music with Pregnancy and Childbirth, The Lullaby Effect
Music is a great mood regulator, whether it’s used in conjunction with exercise or not. Loud, upbeat music generally has a stimulating effect, whereas slow music can act as a sedative.
It’s very encouraging that more and more health professionals are beginning to realize the value of simple techniques such as music, using it as an adjunct to promote healing even in more conventional medical settings. As pediatrician Linda Fisher stated in the article above, it’s the music’s rhythm, melody and tonal quality that puts the patient in that “special place of peace” where healing can be achieved faster.
For example, harp music might be particularly helpful for people who have heart trouble. Harvard researchers have shown that the rhythms of healthy hearts may be similar to those found in classical music, and that certain rhythms, such as that of harp music can cause your heart to beat more normally.
Other studies from the early 1990s concluded that music significantly lowered the heart rates and calmed and regulated the blood pressures and respiration rates of patients who had undergone surgery.
Music therapy has also been shown to:
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Improve motor skills in patients recovering from strokes
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Boost your immune system
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Improve mental focus
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Help control pain
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Create a feeling of well-being
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Reduce anxiety
One study published in the October issue of The Journal of Clinical Nursing found that pregnant women listening to soothing music showed significant reductions in stress, anxiety and depression.
The researchers concluded that,
“The findings can be used to encourage pregnant women to use this cost-effective method of music in their daily life to reduce their stress, anxiety and depression.”
Just more evidence that some of the simplest things in the world can benefit your health in profound ways.
Since depression, general stress and anxiety are very common issues facing many pregnant women, this is excellent advice, especially in light of the ever increasing use of antidepressant drugs during pregnancy. Although some studies claim that using antidepressants during pregnancy does not raise your risk of having a baby with birth defects, others have shown that they can cause severe rebound effects in your baby.
Clearly drugs are rarely the best choice for pregnant women who are depressed. There are so many better options – music being one of them.
In addition to various types of music, like classical, nature sounds such as birds, rainstorms, frogs or ocean waves are also often used as a stress-relief tool. The sounds have a calming effect and can help patients relax while undergoing medical procedures.
Another exceptional, and more scientific, tool to help you dramatically reduce the stress that is a prime contributor to all forms of disease, while maximizing your awareness and potential for growth, is the Insight audio CD. Many of the patients at my clinic (Dr. Mercola.com) have received enormous benefits from it. Layered beneath the soothing sounds of natural rain is a “binaural beat,” which can help you achieve dramatically powerful states of altered consciousness.
Apollo, God of Music and Medicine
September 10th, 2009 · Music and the Olympics, Music Healing, Music Medicine
Apollo, God of Music and Medicine
My first webmaster created a masterful image of Apollo and created an entry to the site, through Apollo. http://healingmusicenterprises.com/Apollo.html. That was 10 years ago now and things have changed, but I still think it is important and interesting to know about Apollo!
According to Wikipedia: In Greek and Roman mythology, Apollo is one of the most important and many-sided of the Olympian deities. The ideal of the kouros (a beardless youth), Apollo has been variously recognized as a god of light and the sun; truth and prophecy; archery; medicine and healing; music, poetry, and the arts; and more. Apollo is the son of Zeus and Leto, and has a twin sister, the chaste huntress Artemis. Apollo is known in Greek-influenced Etruscan mythology as Apulu. Apollo was worshipped in both ancient Greek and Roman religion, as well as in the modern Hellenic neopaganism.As the patron of Delphi (Pythian Apollo), Apollo was an oracular god — the prophetic deity of the Delphic Oracle. Medicine and healing were associated with Apollo, whether through the god himself or mediated through his son Asclepius. Apollo was also seen as a god who could bring ill-health and deadly plague as well as one who had the ability to cure. Amongst the god’s custodial charges, Apollo became associated with dominion over colonists, and as the patron defender of herds and flocks. As the leader of the Muses (Apollon Musagetes) and director of their choir, Apollo functioned as the patron god of music and poetry. Hermes created the lyre for him, and the instrument became a common attribute of Apollo. Hymns sung to Apollo were called paeans.
In Hellenistic times, especially during the third century BCE, as Apollo Helios he became identified among Greeks with Helios, god of the sun, and his sister Artemis similarly equated with Selene, goddess of the moon.[1] In Latin texts, however, Joseph Fontenrose declared himself unable to find any conflation of Apollo with Sol among the Augustan poets of the first century, not even in the conjurations of Aeneas and Latinus in Aeneid XII (161–215).[2] Apollo and Helios/Sol remained separate beings in literary and mythological texts until the third century CE.
Can music improve your workout?
September 10th, 2009 · Music and Cardiovascular Health, Music and Exercise, Music and the Mind-Body
More than 7,000 runners who recently raced in a half-marathon in London were under the influence of a powerful performance-enhancing stimulant — pop music.
The music at London’s “Run to the Beat” race was selected on the basis of the research and consultation of sport psychologist Costas Karageorghis. He has learned how to devise soundtracks that are just as powerful, if not more so, as some of the less legal substances that athletes commonly take to excel.
The link between music and athletic performance is just one example of the inroads scientists and doctors are making into understanding the amazing power that music has over your mind and body. Science has shown that music really can kill pain, reduce stress, better your brain and basically change how you experience life.
Sources: Live Science October 15, 2008
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Music and Your Vocabulary
September 6th, 2009 · Music and the Brain
In 1982, researchers from the University of North Texas performed a three-way test on postgraduate students to see if music could help in memorizing vocabulary words. The students were divided into three groups. Each group was given three tests – a pretest, a posttest, and a test a week after the first two tests. All of the tests were identical. Group 1 was read the words with Handel’s Water Music in the background. They were also asked to imagine the words. Group 2 was read the same words also with Handel’s Water Music in the background. Group 2 was not asked to imagine the words. Group 3 was only read the words, was not given any background music, and was also not asked to imagine the words. The results from the first two tests showed that groups 1 and 2 had much better scores than group 3. The results from the third test, a week later, showed that group 1 performed much better than groups 2 or 3. However, simply using music while learning does not absolutely guarantee recall but can possibly improve it. Background music in itself is not a part of the learning process, but it does enter into memory along with the information learned. Recall is better when the same music used for learning is used during recall. Also, tempo appears to be a key of music’s effect on memory.
What does the unborn baby hear?
September 5th, 2009 · Music with Pregnancy and Childbirth
What can the unborn baby hear?
Of all the questions I get, this is probably one of the top five. We know for sure that by the beginning of the second trimester, the growing infant’s ear is functional. In the beginning baby mainly hears the sounds of mother’s heartbeat and digestive sounds. But with each passing day, baby begins to hear outside sounds of talking, music, loud traffic and most anything else.
For that reason, it is very important to keep Mom’s sonic environment peaceful and quiet. Even unborn babies can be traumatized by lots of loud noises, screaming, shouting, loud rock music, etc. Be good to yourself and your baby during this precious time of life for both of you. If you feel like working, that’s fine, but just keep any loud noises or extreme agitation to a minimum!
Of course, playing soft music is always a good idea. I have created a Lullaby CD that is highly recommended!
As always, please let me know your questions!
An amazing new vocal group-creativity plus!
August 30th, 2009 · Announcements
Who are The Voca People?
The Voca people are 8 friendly aliens from the planet Voca, a musical planet that has no verbal communication but use vocal expressions only. They have heard the music from earth for decades now and with their imitation abilities they have decided to pay a one evening tribute to humanity and to perform the songs they love as musical- gratitude.
The Voca People is an ensemble of 8 talented musician-actors; 3 female singers that bring the very best female sounds (alt, mezzo, soprano) and 3 male singers (bass, baritone, tenor. In addition there are 2 beat box artists that create extraordinary human beat box sounds and are considered to be the best performers in their field.
This innovative performance is one of the only acts in the world that combines singers and beat box performers to bring an entire orchestra without any musical instruments.
This unique comical and theatrical framework and the mega mixes they bring to the stage – distinguish them from other vocal groups.
The show is adaptable in length, from 20 minutes to a full theatrical show of 80 minutes and suits audiences of all ages, languages and crosses all cultural barriers.
