Music-Based Cognitive Remediation Therapy for Patients with Traumatic Brain Injury

Abstract

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is one of the common causes of disability in physical, psychological, and social domains of functioning leading to poor quality of life. TBI leads to impairment in sensory, motor, language, and emotional processing, and also in cognitive functions such as attention, information processing, executive functions, and memory. Cognitive impairment plays a central role in functional recovery in TBI. Innovative methods such as music therapy to alleviate cognitive impairments have been investigated recently. The role of music in cognitive rehabilitation is evolving, based on newer findings emerging from the fields of neuromusicology and music cognition. Research findings from these fields have contributed significantly to our understanding of music perception and cognition, and its neural underpinnings. From a neuroscientific perspective, indulging in music is considered as one of the best cognitive exercises. With “plasticity” as its veritable nature, brain engages in producing music indulging an array of cognitive functions and the product, the music, in turn permits restoration and alters brain functions. With scientific findings as its basis, “neurologic music therapy” (NMT) has been developed as a systematic treatment method to improve sensorimotor, language, and cognitive domains of functioning via music. A preliminary study examining the effect of NMT in cognitive rehabilitation has reported promising results in improving executive functions along with improvement in emotional adjustment and decreasing depression and anxiety following TBI. The potential usage of music-based cognitive rehabilitation therapy in various clinical conditions including TBI is yet to be fully explored. There is a need for systematic research studies to bridge the gap between increasing theoretical understanding of usage of music in cognitive rehabilitation and application of the same in a heterogeneous condition such as TBI.

Assessing a cognitive music training for older participants: a randomised controlled trial

“…The group comparisons between pre‐intervention and post‐intervention showed significant improvements for the experimental group in almost all tests, especially the MMSE and the CDT, while the control group had stable performance in all tests. Considering these findings, we can argue that the cognitive music training programme improved participants' general cognitive functions, selective attention, planning and logic skills, and abilities related to access and lexical retrieval, according to the findings of previous studies (Brotons and Koger, ; François and Schön, ; Hegde, ; Romero‐Naranjo, ; Särkämö et al, ). In addition, the significant improvements of the experimental group in the CDT could be explained by improvements in anticipation processing linked to planning and logical ability stimulated by the music improvisation exercises (Biasutti, ).…”

Music as Medicine: The Therapeutic Potential of Music for Acute Stroke Patients

“…45,59 Music therapy improves executive functioning and eases the adjustment to rehabilitation in patients with traumatic brain injury. 60,61 Recently, it was reported that music listening significantly enhanced cognitive functioning in verbal memory and focused attention (P < .01 and P < .05, respectively, mixed-model analysis of variance), and decreased depression and confusion (both P < .10, 1-way analysis of variance), or positive emotion, in patients after middle cerebral artery stroke compared with control participants. 62 It is often difficult to maintain a positive attitude when experiencing sudden life-changing events, which is especially true for patients who are emergently admitted to the ICU.…”

Cognitive remediation in schizophrenia—The view from India

“…Cognitive rehabilitation is a confluence of therapeutic activities based on brain-behaviour relationships (Hegde, 2014). Functional improvement is achieved by re-establishing or reinforcing previously learned adaptive patterns of behaviour, facilitating improvement in cognitive functions through compensatory mechanisms and sometimes facilitating new patterns of activity through external compensatory mechanisms.…”