Music Therapy in the ICU — Another Way to Lower Sedation Use?

Music therapy improves well-being in hospice patients, distracts patients during endoscopy, and helps treat depression in elders. Could it also decrease anxiety in critically ill patients?

Investigators randomized 373 awake and interactive intensive care unit (ICU) patients to one of three groups: patient-directed music through noise-cancelling headphones (with a visit by a music therapist to find preferred music and twice-daily prompts to listen to music); patient-initiated noise-cancelling headphone use only; or usual care. Anxiety was assessed daily with a 100-point visual-analog scale (VAS; range, 0 = “not anxious at all” to 100 = “most anxious ever”), and sedation doses and frequency were analyzed post hoc.

During a mean follow-up of 6 days, daily VAS scores of patients who received patient-directed music were significantly lower (by a mean of 19 points) than those of patients who received usual care; the headphones-alone group scored nonsignificantly lower (by a mean of 8 points) than the usual-care group. Sedation use was somewhat lower in the music-treated group.