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maximizing stroke recovery: the potential role of music therapy in rehabilitation

a new ongoing study aims to change how people recover from stroke by turning up the tunes.

by angelica bottaro
published mar 22, 2024
read time 5 minute read
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read time 5 minute read
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science has long investigated the power of music on the brain and found that it has several beneficial impacts, including activating the brain’s reward centre. getty images
in the famous words of the hamilton brothers, music makes the world go round—but as it turns out, it can also improve healthcare for stroke patients. research being conducted has found that listening to music, specifically, holds some power when used as a rehabilitation therapy for those who have experienced stroke.
so, letting the melodies take hold isn’t simply for fun anymore. it can lead to better outcomes for those with severe brain conditions to the point of improving a person’s ability to recover, increasing their overall quality of life.
anthonia aina, a ph.d. candidate at the university of toronto and physiotherapist, is currently researching music and its ability to positively affect stroke patients and their recovery. she has found that the way music interacts with the brain can be highly beneficial for stroke rehabilitation.
“whenever we listen to music, we engage the reward system in the midbrain. we know that when you listen to music, there is this feedback and feed-forward mechanism that happens within the brain,” said anthonia, describing the ability of music to keep people motivated to complete activities prudent for their recovery.
she continued, “so when you perform a task, you are encouraged to stay longer. once you make it into an activity that you can enjoy with music, the participants were going above and beyond.”

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as more canadians experience stroke, survival rates are also up
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the power of music and its connection to brain health

science has long investigated the power of music on the brain and found that it has several beneficial impacts, including activating the brain’s reward centre, helping to create new neural connections, and improving mood. the research has been used to help progress the recovery and management of many neurological diseases, including alzheimer’s disease, parkinson’s disease, and multiple sclerosis (ms).
the benefits come down to one thing: how music reaches and changes the brain and its many pathways. areas of the brain affected by music include:
  • cerebrum: involved in coordination, speech, judgement, thinking and reasoning, problem-solving, emotions, and learning
  • cerebellum: involved in coordinating movement and balance, language and attention, vision and eye movement
  • limbic system: involved in motivation and reward
  • frontal pathway: involved in cognition and decision-making
  • motor pathway: involved in movement
according to anthonia and many others who have researched the connection between melody and brain health, music’s power comes from its ability to influence all these parts of the brain.
“when we hear music, many parts of our brain get activated, and it’s because of this activation without actively doing anything physical that there is a potential to strengthen the connections within these various paths of the brain,” she said.
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canadian society for exercise physiology
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effects of stroke and where music can play a role

following a stroke, people are often left severely impaired. while there are differing degrees of severity, many people experience life-altering changes, including:
  • difficulty holding things
  • excessive fatigue or tiredness
  • incontinence
  • chronic pain
  • restricted mobility
  • issues with swallowing or vision
  • weakness or paralysis affecting one side of the body
  • depression and anxiety
  • personality changes, including irritability or aggressiveness, lack of social etiquette and impulsiveness
  • changes in their ability to learn, plan, problem solve, concentrate, or hold onto memories
  • changes in how they perceive temperatures, contact with others, distance, and watching tv or reading a book
  • difficulty finding the right words or understanding others
  • being unable to speak or finding it difficult to speak
these after-effects can severely lower someone’s quality of life and leave them feeling out of control, depressed, and as if there is no light at the end of the tunnel.
while they may not be able to see the light, they can hear sounds coming from the end of that tunnel – the sound of music. the current research has all but proven the myriad of impairments from a stroke can be positively influenced by a good jam session.
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one study, in particular, found that music therapy could benefit both neurologic and neuropsychiatric impairments that develop following a stroke, including:
  • motor rehabilitation
  • speech regeneration
  • cognitive recovery
these areas are often most important when it comes to living a normal day-to-day life without challenges, and if music makes a difference, it has a strong place in stroke rehabilitation.

tapping into the healing properties of music for stroke patients

anthonia is well-versed in the data surrounding music and its therapeutic properties, having kept up to date on others’ research and overseeing her own. currently, her research aims to compare the differences in people with stroke based on four different variations of sound:
  • the participants preferred music
  • an audiobook
  • neutral music
  • silence
the goal of the study is to determine how well people move, how long they move, and how quickly they tire, depending on the type of sound they experience. each sound will offer different results, with the person’s chosen tunes being the most effective for helping change the brain in ways that foster recovery and rehabilitation.
“we know that music can lead to something called entrainment, and what entrainment means is that our bodies sync to the rhythm of the music. with that kind of knowledge, we can train participants to rehab their lower limbs by asking them to walk to the rhythm of the music,” anthonia said. “gradually, we can increase the rhythm, and as they get better, they can also increase the speed and velocity. over time, that translates to better recovery and faster and safer ambulation.”
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current treatments for stroke, while viable, do not cover all bases. only 10 per cent of people who have had a stroke recover completely from the event, and 25 per cent are left with minor impairment. while those numbers are promising for a third of people who have a stroke, they don’t tell the whole story.
out of all stroke cases, 40, 10, and 15 per cent continue to live with moderate-to-serve impairment requiring special care, severe impairment requiring long-term care, or death shortly after, respectively.
music therapy is not the be-all-end-all for stroke rehabilitation, but if used in conjunction with other methods, it could help those who suffer from worsened outcomes get closer to a better quality of life and less impairment overall.
“it’s important for stroke because after a stroke, typically, there is an injury to the brain. once that injury occurs, we, as physiotherapists and many other clinicians, are looking for how to preserve the remaining part of the brain and encourage those parts of the brain to take over some of the function that the injured part of the brain has lost,” she said. “it [music] could potentially help create those new pathways, called neuroplasticity, that would overall benefit a person who has had a stroke.”
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while her research is ongoing, anthonia’s previous work found connections between music and recovery that deserve more attention, and she continues to work toward finding new and exciting ways to help those with debilitating chronic impairments find hope for a higher quality of life after a stroke.
angelica bottaro
angelica bottaro

angelica bottaro is the lead editor at healthing.ca, and has been content writing for over a decade, specializing in all things health. her goal as a health journalist is to bring awareness and information to people that they can use as an additional tool toward their own optimal health.

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