August 17, 2020 | Blogs and News
By Mireille Karadanaian — 3 min read —
Children’s Music Fund and Creative Healing for Youth in Pain (chyp) co-sponsored a panel discussion focusing on Music Therapy as a complement to medical treatments and how it can provide children with coping mechanisms for their chronic pain and illness.
The panel represented experts in pain management, pediatrics medicine, neuropsychology, and Music Therapy. This blog is the first of a series that will provide a greater understanding of how Music Therapy works and its benefits when it comes to relieving chronic pain.
We’re all healing something. But there’s a difference between curing something and healing it. To heal, we need to embrace our challenges and embark on a journey that doesn’t just offer us a quick solution, but that changes our physical and emotional lives.
If music is a universal language, then maybe Music Therapy is a universal form of therapy. It can address physical therapy goals, occupational therapy goals, speech therapy goals and more because it’s not just about music, it’s about the relationship you’re having with a therapist.
Our founder and president of Children’s Music Fund, Raffi Tachdjian, MD, spoke about just that. Our mission is to bring children peace and support in a non-medicinal form—Music Therapy. Having a music therapist remind a child that they are more than their illness and can find a sanctuary in the notes and rhythms of a song, can help many overcome the fear, pain and anxiety of a hospital visit or treatment.
Music is a versatile and powerful tool that can offer pockets of peace and relief among patients and individuals with chronic pain, and it more importantly inspires the hope they had otherwise lost. A crucial step in the healing process involves allowing children to have a creative outlet in order to regain their sense of control and to explain how they feel.
Many children have kept their emotions bottled up inside for a long time, unable to share their stories and struggles. When they can finally express their pain emotionally, their physical response may be out of proportion to that pain.
Music not only provides an emotional benefit to patients, but a physical one as well. Each of us have a parasympathetic system and a sympathetic (fight or flight) system, and music has a way of recalibrating this nervous system so our body’s innate healing mechanisms can kick in.
Music also activates the dopaminergic areas on the brain that inspire happiness and reward in the child. Additionally, oxytocin, a hormone associated with bonding and memory, is released and creates an even stronger sense of kinship between the child and their music therapist.
This is why we resonate with a specific song in the Music Therapy session and later remember all the emotions and memories associated with it. With this positive connection between song and mind, lots of children can redefine their experiences in hospitals and use their favorite music to lighten their mood.
Dr. Lonnie Zeltzer, a research professor of pediatrics, anesthesiology, psychiatry and biobehavioral sciences at UCLA, founded the Creative Healing for Youth in Pain in her mission to aid chronically ill children in their healing journeys. She thinks Music Therapy is one of the most profound forms of treatment because rather than provide temporary relief, like medication does, it changes the architecture and pathways in the brain.
“Think of the development of pain as a new neural connection that spins on and on. Music Therapy is a way to guide that energy and rushing pain stream to other pathways. When you have less electrical activity and you begin to focus all your energy on music, the pain lessens. In return, the creative parts of the brain get stronger.”
Particularly in these difficult times, we should all rely on one another for strength and hope. By being a part of well-knitted communities like Children’s Music Fund and chyp, families and children can find a kernel of comfort and ease. Thank you to all the speakers: Jon Samson, Raffi Tachdjian, Talin Babikian, Lonnie Zeltzer, Georgia Weston, and Jenna Bollard. We appreciate your time and sharing your expertise.
The non-profit chyp works to help kids and their parents deal with chronic pain. There are a plethora of common healthcare barriers that individuals face on a daily basis, and chyp works to eliminate those by offering online resources that inspire strength, health and hope in the lives of today’s youth.
The non-profit Children’s Music Fund focuses on overcoming pain, fear and anxiety that children experience during hospitalization or treatment by allowing the power of Music Therapy to heal their mind, soul and body.
Watch our webinar to learn more about pain management and the benefits of Music Therapy for our youth!
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