Listening to music and being bounced up and down has helped a young woman who was paralyzed regain consciousness and could be a new neurological treatment method, a Japanese professor said at Taipei Medical University (TMU) yesterday.
At the Conscious Brain and Rhythms of Music conference held at TMU, Osaka University of Arts professor and composer Ryo Noda spoke about the use of musico-kinetic therapy to treat persistent vegetative state patients.
A 27-year-old Japanese woman, who was paralyzed after surviving a car crash four years ago, was in a state of deep unconsciousness — a three on the Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) — and was was on nasogastric tube feeding.
Beginning in March 2013, the patient’s parents started taking her to an Osaka hospital for Noda’s musico-kinetic therapy twice a week for 30-minute sessions. Four to five therapists would work together, with some holding her and bouncing up and down on the bed, while others played music, Noda said.
He said that the music chosen included hit songs from the Japanese pop group SMAP, the theme song of the Japanese cartoon Doraemon, American pop music, classical music by Chopin and the occasional Japanese nursery rhyme.
The patient has regained partial oral communication ability, including singing, and is able to feed herself, as well as remember some telephone numbers, he said.
He said her GCS score is now 15 — the best response level on the neurological response scale.
TMU’s Brain and Consciousness Research Center director Chiang Yung-hsiao (蔣永孝) said Noda’s musico-kinetic therapy, including bouncing movements, makes use of melody and gravity to stimulate the hypothalamus, increasing the release of beta-endorphin and the recovery of neurological functions.
He said the center is to further discuss the possibility of cooperating with Noda on musico-kinetic therapy research.
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