You Should Be Using Music with Your Patients with Brain Injury

Image: Xiao-Xuan Yang Dancigers

Music has the ability to go deep and move us.  We have all been on the dance floor when “our jam” comes on and you just have to pick up the pace and move with the music.  You had no choice.  Contemplate that for a moment, why is that?  Why does it feel so good to match your movements to the beat?  Let’s dive in…

We will use the research study: Interactions between auditory and dorsal premotor cortex during

synchronization to musical rhythms, by Joyce L. Chen, Robert J. Zatorre, Virginia B. Penhune, 2006 in NeuroImage to explain the premise.  (open source!)

To start off- some background information on

An assemblage of what I learned in 2014

I’ve learned so much over the last year… both in PT and in business, interaction and skill sets… Let me try to compile some things.  I think a lot of these are my own thoughts, but with the amount of information and exposure I have been blasted with… I doubt they all originate in my cortex, please forgive me.

Perhaps this docket of diction will resonate with you.  If you don’t read the whole thing- attempt to make a list for yourself…

Warning: wear a vest, there will be lots of bullets…

The Power of Silence

Image Credit: NASA

It is the space between the notes that make the music.  A wash of sound and pitch and tone does not stir emotion or evoke dance and tears.  It is the time taken, and placed, between to the vibrations that add meaning.

It is the silence and expanse of nature and wilderness that allows the existence of city life.  It must be there, a place to go to, or the mind cannot breathe.

When looking at the earth from space, we do not assume the only activity or important part is the part that is lit up.  The darkened areas are alive as well.  This is also the case with fMRI.  Yes one part is lit up, but this says nothing about the importance of the less active or “silent” areas.  They too are playing an important role.

And so it goes for any meaningful interaction, and in particular, care-based interaction.  Silence is the time when the ideas can settle, when concepts can take root, when importance is emphasized.

We all know that a good history can yield some superb differential diagnosis choices. This can only happen in environmentally appropriate silence.  We already know what we know.  Therefore we can keep quiet about it.  We don’t know what the patient knows… so we must listen.

Silence has a time component.  Perhaps that’s why it’s so hard to come by…

Give silence a chance.

–Matt D

How to start a Journal Club

I had the awesome experience of starting and coordinating the ODU DPT Journal Club over the past year.  I started it wanting to know what was being put out there in research (the First Pillar), and that was certainly valuable.  I found out, however, that the most valuable aspect of Journal Club is the conversation.  Everyone has different perspectives, reads the same line in a different way, asks different questions and can see what you don’t see.  I learned a ton from participating in this process and you certainly will too.

So, without further ado, here are my tips on how to start a PT Journal Club (J-Club):