Effect of Music Therapy on Pain After Orthopedic Surgery—A Systematic Review and Meta‐Analysis

Abstract

Background Although music interventions on postoperative pain (POP) have positive effects, limited research has focused on systematic reviews and meta‐analyses of its efficacy for orthopedic patients. This systematic review aimed to examine the effects of music therapy on pain after orthopedic surgery. Method The Cochrane Library, PubMed, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), Nursing Reference Center (NRC), Airiti Library, and National Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations in Taiwan were searched up to August 2019. The risk of bias from the Cochrane Handbook for Randomized Controlled Trials of Interventions was used. A standard mean difference (SMD) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) was applied as a summary effect on postoperative pain and anxiety using RevMan version 5.3. A meta‐analysis was also carried out using subgroup analysis. Results Nine randomized controlled trials were selected. (1) Music can relieve pain significantly for both music medicine (MM; SMD = −0.41, 95% CI [−0.75, −0.07], P = 0.02) and music therapy (MT; SMD = −0.31, 95% CI [−0.57, 0.04], P = 0.02). (2) Music chosen by the subjects showed significant differences for both MM (P = 0.002) and MT (P = 0.02). (3) Anxiety improved significantly among patients using MT (SMD = 0.44, 95% CI [−0.75, −0.13], P = 0.005). However, the results for the physiologic parameters, opioid requirement, and length of stay showed subtle distinctions. Conclusion Music can significantly relieve POP, specifically music chosen by the participants.

The effect of musical interventions in improving short-term pain outcomes following total knee replacement: a meta-analysis and systematic review

“…Therefore, we assume whether increasing the frequency of music may be associated with a positive efficiency. A similar assumption was supported in a previous systematic review [34], but varying surgical procedures may result in unreliable evidence. As correlation studies are limited in TKR surgery, this study failed to obtain an accurate answer.…”

“…Due to its high heterogeneity, attaining a firm conclusion about the effectiveness of musical interventions in those treated with TKR is difficult. Furthermore, another meta-analysis and systematic review reported the effect of musical therapy on pain following orthopedic surgery, where musical interventions were found to relieve pain [34]. The study included a series of surgical operations when assessing the utility of listening to music after TKR, including the position of the knee, hip, shoulder, spine, and others.…”

Analgesic effect of music during wound care among patients with diaphyseal tibial fractures: Randomized controlled trial

“…Some studies have evaluated the analgesic effect of music in other surgical procedures (knee, hip, and spine) (Lin et al., 2019), and others demonstrated benefits of using music in burn dressing changes (Hsu et al., 2016; Rohilla et al., 2018). However, to the best of our knowledge, this is the first blinded, randomized controlled trial that demonstrates the analgesic efficacy of music during the dressing change of surgical tibial fracture, rather than isolated use in standard pharmacological analgesia.…”

“…Among these resources, music has been increasingly studied and developed as a viable complementary therapy in the management of pain in several healthcare settings. Studies point to a statistically significant reduction in pain scores in adult patients undergoing orthopedic surgeries, after listening to music (Lin et al., 2019; Schneider, 2018). This is a low‐cost tool that can be used by the nursing team, for pain and anxiety relief (Sharda et al., 2019).…”

One additional shot of brachial plexus block equates to less postoperative pain for younger children with elbow surgeries

“…Besides, the description of pain provided by the children is usually inconclusive [8]. Several non-pharmacological methods, including position adjustment, reassurance [9], and music, have been proposed to alleviate the pain [10][11][12].…”