Musik in der Rehabilitation von Patienten mit onkologischen Erkrankungen

Abstract

Due to the continuous development of effective oncological treatments, additive and supportive therapy strategies as well as palliative interventions play an important role in the rehabilitation of cancer patients. The improvement of quality of life is the main intention of all these therapeutic strategies, one of them music as a therapeutic approach. This article intends to show the possible use of music in the rehabilitation of patients with oncological diseases. Therapeutic approaches are either active or passive (receptive) methods offering music. Application of music encompasses effects on fear, verbalization, anger, coping with death wish, spirituality, pain, nausea, vomiting, facilitation of movements, disability, withdrawal, tension, retreat, communication with family members and caregivers. To allow the reader a practical insight, two patient's reports at the end of the article are presented. Conclusions: The use of music in the sense of integrative biopsychosocial measures is very promising in the rehabilitation of patients with malignant diseases. All the manifold possibilities to use music as a therapy intend to improve the QOL of the patients. Music could thus be part of rehabilitation of cancer patients. Future studies should further describe the connections of the positive influence of music on cancer patients to optimize the therapy options in this field.