Music Therapy in Dementia

Dementia is not a single condition; it describes a set of symptoms that may include impairment in memory, communication, and thinking. Alzheimer’s disease is the most common form of dementia and may contribute to 60 to 80% of cases. Alzheimer’s dementia results in permanent impairment of social or occupational functioning which includes difficulty in recognizing close ones or solving critical problems. Out of various researched remedies for treating patients suffering from dementia, music therapy is one such technique that is being practiced across the world. The impact of various types of sounds causes positive changes over neural synapses and plays a significant role in improving the severe symptoms in patients. Music therapy and the personal/private carers and nurses appointed to give such treatments to the patients have been shown to play an important role in curing dementia. The present chapter describes the basics of dementia and the mechanism of action of music therapy. Evidence from various case studies regarding the success of direct and indirect music therapy have been discussed in curing dementia.