Living With Dementia Summary

It is an inevitable fact that the twenty-first century will be impacted by the largest geriatric population of any century. In 2015, the World Health Organization announced that currently 47.5 million people on earth are living with dementia and approximately 7.7 new cases are surfacing every year (WHO, 2015). The U.S.public health system is at a point where it will have to focus its efforts on an entirely different approach to accommodate the growing elderly population that live with dementia. “Dementia is a neurocognitive disorder caused by various brain illnesses that affect perception, cognition and motor function” (Ridder & Gummesen, 2015). Dementia directly affects quality of life (QOL) of the elderly, and it can impair “participation,

Humans by nature are also social beings; therefore, applying the use of music therapy in a group setting can help with these aspects of QOL. In the study written by Gold, the author observed the influences of music therapy applied in a group setting to patients with severe dementia (Gold, 2014). On a weekly basis, four to eight dementia patients interacted with a music therapist for a music therapy session. In a circle, the patients were given various percussion instruments to drum. The purpose of the session was to generate an environment that not only produced creative music, but also an environment for the patients to connect with other patients. Despite the unsureness, the observations showed that there was a higher positive behavioral output during music therapy Thursdays versus standard care days with no music therapy sessions. The notes written by the medical staff also indicated that eight of the nine patients were less agitated, easier to interact with, and less of a burden when music therapy sessions had taken place at the beginning of the day. All in all, the end results showed that music therapy significantly generated a more positive atmosphere, thus increasing social interaction and expressive engagement for the dementia patients.

From an individual standpoint, music therapy can be more effective when the interaction

In 2011, Professors Choi and Hong used songwriting activities to trigger cognitive function in dementia patients (Hong & Choi, 2011). A total of 30 patients were divided into a free activity group (control group) or songwriting group (experimental group) for 16 weeks. The authors used three stages to apply the songwriting activity: (1) finding preferred songs or genre of music, (2) rewriting the lyrics to a song, and (3) performing the rewritten songs. The MMSE-K (Mini-Mental State Examination-Korea) found that cognitive function improved by 26% in the songwriting group (experimental group). Overall, the areas that had improved were orientation, memory attention and calculation, language, and comprehension and