Music Reduces Pain For Babies During Circumcision
Ever heard of music therapy? Well this is something else entirely.
Music may help to relieve pain for babies going under the knife for common medical procedures like circumcision, according to new research from scientists at the University of Alberta in Canada. The research was based on the thought that playing music calms infants and stabilizes some of their vital functions. Apparently, the trend is becoming increasingly popular in neonatal hospital wards across North America.
Some of the tests determining the scientists’ results were a bit shaky because tests included different study populations (both premature and full-term babies) and the babies were tested in different ways. But the researchers did conclude that there was “very preliminary evidence” that playing music had benefits during blood sampling and circumcision.
The most interesting study, one that the researchers referred to as “high quality,” tested the effects of lullabies and nursery rhymes during circumcision. The results revealed that playing these familiar songs did reduce pain and prevent the babies’ heart rates from increasing during the surgery.
However, the authors of the report stated that more “high quality trials” are needed to confirm the benefits.
Funny thing about all this is that the use of music during surgery or to reduce pain has been an accepted practice for thousands of years in some Middle Eastern nations that practice Ayurvedic medicine (a form of integrated medicine that includes acupuncture and mind-body healing techniques like sound frequency therapy). Why is it that Western scientists are just catching on to this right now?
At any rate, thank goodness that they are, because this type of pills-free pain reliever is helpful for adults as well as infants. I can’t tell you what a relief it would be to walk into my doctor’s office for a shot and have them offer me a pair of headphones with my favorite music blasting to ease my the anxiety or make me forget about the pain all together.
What do you think about music’s power to heal and relieve pain? Is it all myth, or is music the perfect drug?
Source: U.S. News & World Report
Saturday, May 30, 2009 12:22AM
how about Rockabye Baby's lullaby version of "Boys Don't Cry" by the cure…lol
Saturday, May 30, 2009 1:02PM
This is just great news. Next time I go for a root canal treatment or when I have my appendix removed I won't need to have those nasty anesthesia injections. I can just listen to my favourite nursery rhymes and be pain free.
WHAT A LOAD OF CROCK!!
Just imagine, if we just stopped performing circumcisions – there would be no need for music – or stupid studies such as these.:
Saturday, May 30, 2009 6:55PM
"Just imagine, if we just stopped performing [infant] circumcisions – there would be no need for…stupid studies such as these."
I second that comment. I'd like to add that we'd also be much better parents, and health care providers, and our boys would be a lot better off. No slip-ups and circumcision deaths either. How about that. "First do no harm" goes a long way.
Saturday, May 30, 2009 11:37PM
Remember "A Clockwork Orange"? What this may do is give circumcised boys and men a violent dislike for music.
Sunday, May 31, 2009 6:26PM
Cultures that practice female circumcision have known this for thousands of years: the joyous singing of the women who attend and perform the ceremony eases the brief pain. And the Jews wail and sing while they amputate sexual tissue too. What great news for circumcisers the world over! This research could be improved greatly by strapping down some doctors and amputating sexual tissue from them – with informed consent provided by the researchers of course – while playing loud music of various genres, to determine the best kind of music.
Monday, June 1, 2009 2:05AM
You can test this theory yourself, at home.
First, push a knife into your genitals,.
Then put on some soothing music.
Push knife into genitals again.
Was it a more pleasant experience the second time?
How insulting to our intelligence was it, to post this article. Who does Beat Crave think it is serving?
Certainly not the boy who is strapped down with headphones on, feeling half his penis skin being amputated for no valid health reason.
There used to be this little thing, called journalistic integrity. Perhaps Beat Crave should look into it.
Perhaps, they should stop dispensing moronic medical advice. It might be even better if they close up shop. Articles like this which attempt to candy coat cutting on kids for cosmetic reasons, help perpetuate an undefendable practice. How many circumcised Americans went to their grave of AIDS?
Monday, June 1, 2009 4:54AM
Oh, sure it does! Just watch this and tell me that anything in the world could soothe or compensate a child for this. And WATCH it. Don't wuss out. A baby doesn't have that option.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQqOEylGW7k
Monday, June 1, 2009 4:58AM
Music is a competing stimulus. It doesn't cut out the pain altogether necessarily, but it has been proven to help.
http://www.musictherapy.org
Thanks,
MT-BC
Monday, June 1, 2009 5:03AM
Here is an abstract for your viewing pleasure:
http://jpo.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/12/1/...
Monday, June 1, 2009 10:16AM
You can test this for yourself.
First, cut your genitals with a knife.
Then, put on some soothing music.
Next, cut your genitals with a knife.
There now. Didn't it feel less painful the second time?
Monday, June 1, 2009 10:17AM
If Beat Crave can't do better than print articles with content like this, perhaps it's time to consider going into another business.
Monday, June 1, 2009 9:20PM
This is astounding. If you don't look too closely, it looks like "scientific research". If you think about it for more than 10 seconds, you can see, -it really is surgery without anesthesia, -in a word torture. Sure, after you pass out, it is "less painful". Those clever Doctors!
Doctors have skipped the "hassle" of anesthesia on subjects when they were not important: poor,or black, Jewish, (at the hands of the Nazis) or simply babies, who "always cry".
By circumcising, they make a mockery of the "healing profession."
Tom Tobin's comments are great.
Jews have every right to circumsize themselves, just not their children. "Custom and tradition" do not make slavery or circumcision right.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009 2:02AM
Nowhere in this article does it say that anesthesia was not used IN ADDITION TO music. THINK, people.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009 8:39PM
How is a lullaby a "familiar" song to a baby that is one or two days old? They haven't been around long enough for anything to be "familiar"!
And if proper anesthesia was used, there would be NO pain (during the procedure, at least. Post-op would still be miserable for a week or so of course) and therefore no need to study the effectiveness of music as pain relief. So obviously anesthesia was not used. It almost never is for infant circumcision. SIck, but true.
WJA and Tom Tobin have got it right!
Wednesday, June 3, 2009 10:03PM
In any case, the study of the MUSIC is important. Too many people here just focused on the issue of circumcision. That was just one example
Wednesday, June 3, 2009 11:31PM
In the last study I saw, even though pain relief is very highly recommended by the AMA and AAP, only 14% of doctors performing infant circumcision were using anesthesia.
How is this not torture?
Wednesday, June 10, 2009 11:20AM
How important IS MUSIC, when you are having the most sensitive part of your body cut off, anyway?
Do you think the kid is really hearing the music, while he is likely in the most pain he will ever feel?
Would you like to trade places with him? I'll give you a good pair of headphones.
Maybe there is some validity somewhere in the article. Maybe it is a good idea to play soothing music while you take blood out of a child, for necessary testing. But for unnecessary, painful cosmetic surgery?
I don't think so.
Try reading the article, replacing 'circumcision' with 'female circumcision', and see if it begins to bother you, as it rightfully should.
Welcome to planet Earth. OWWWWWWWW.
We can, and need to, do better. We need to stop this ugly practice, which is rapidly diminishing everywhere in the English speaking world, except for the US, where it is slowly diminishing. And we have to pay less attention to ill-thought out articles, mindlessly published, in places such as this.
We need to start using logic and reason, and not look to constantly excuse circumcision, like it is exceptional, like our drug addict cousin. There is no other operation which removes healthy parts from an unconsenting person. We need to stop pretending this is news or science. It is the science equivalent of the magazines you see at the grocery store, with 'circumcision' instead of 'Brad and Angelina'. Beat Crave is perpetuating junk science, to fill up their space, and make a little money doing it. Beat Crave needs to clean up its act a bit, if they want to maintain, or gain, credibility.