Music at Department of Clinical Physiology and Nuclear Medicine
The department of clinical physiology and nuclear medicine at Herlev University Hopital perform a great number of examinations in nuclear medicine including dedicated PET-CT, but also physiological investigations such as pulmonary function tests, exercise-ECG, and measurement of blood pressure in legs, toes and fingers. Besides, they have a great number of osteoporosis evaluations with DXA scanning.
Mona Gerhardt, a nurse in the Clinical Physiology Ward at Herlev Hospital, Denmark has used music and the Maysound player with MusiCure music for many years and received feedback from over 100 heart patients.
Many of the patients are in various stages of a personal health crisis, and the way they react physically (such as their blood pressure levels) can have a major impact. “There has been positive feedback from using the music players from patients in all stages of the process. One patient told me she had looked forward to coming here and hearing the music again all week”, says Mona Gerhardt.
Heart and cancer patients undergoing long examinations say it is pleasant to experience the music via the Maysound player, and staffs from several hospitals have reported that hearing the music in the background improves their working environment. The special sound bubble surrounding the patient allows staff to work and communicate in the room, without the music seeming too loud. It also permits them to go over to the patient and communicate using normal voice levels.
Another group of patients Mona Gerhard has studied are cancer patients receiving chemotherapy who are undergoing a PET scan (which involves injection of a radioactive tracer). During this examination it is important that the muscles are completely relaxed and patients lie still for a whole hour. All 30 patients preferred listening to music through the player during the procedure, as opposed to having no music. “The music does more than just calm patients. It distracts their thoughts, so that time seems to pass more quickly, and dampens the background hospital noise.”
Source: Fysiologisk Afdeling, Herlev Hospital, og interview by Eva Helena Andersen
See posters from the research projects at The department of clinical physiology and nuclear medicine at Herlev University Hopital, under Publications and articles