The Effect of Thai Traditional Music on Cognitive Function, Psychological Health and Quality of Sleep Among Thai Older Individuals With Dementia

Dementia, regardless of its cause, has been recognized to be one of the most important and common problems among the elderly worldwide. The prevalence of dementia has been increasing gradually throughout the world. It is associated with medical and psychological consequences, especially in the advanced stage of the condition. Medications for dementia, specifically, acetylcholine esterase inhibitors, have proven efficacy but variable individual response. They are very expensive and stress families and insurance payers. Dementia and its neuropsychiatric co-morbidities effects not only individual patients, but also family members and care givers as it stresses interpersonal relationships, increases the need for personal care, nursing home placement, and the use of neuropsychiatric medications. Any new approach to improve cognitive function, behavior, mood and sleep quality among demented individuals therefore could have far reaching benefits for patients, care givers, financially responsive parties, and the country as a whole.

There are several studies focusing on the non-pharmacologic approaches to care of the demented. The objectives were to reduce reliance on prescribed medications with these adjunctive therapies. One of the interesting non-drug trials was about music therapy. It was found that music could improve behavioral and social functions among individual demented patients. However, the methodology of each music study varied considerably. To our knowledge, there has been no music study in dementia performed in Thailand using our unique Thai traditional music. We therefore aim to study this non-pharmacologic approach in Thai demented individuals using Thai traditional music. We hypothesized that regular listening to Thai traditional music will improve cognitive function, activities of daily living, mood, behavior and sleep quality in Thai demented patients.

Inclusion criteria

• Age > 60 years
• Diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease, vascular dementia or mixed dementia by ICD-10
• No change in neuropsychiatric drugs for at least 4-week before and 8-week during the study
• CD player available at home
• Patient and care giver consent to study

Exclusion criteria

• Severe depression requiring aggressive treatment or hospitalization
• Dementia with Lewy body, multisystem atrophy
• Treatable dementia
• Active medical problems
• Profound hearing loss