May 2012 - Surgical Serenity Solutions

Want Music with Your Surgery?: the Time is NOW!

There has never been a better time to utilize the power of music with your surgery. For several decades now, surgeons have been playing their favorite music in the O.R. but it was assumed that if the patient was under general anesthesia, that they did not need their own music, nor were they affected by the surgeon’s music. Current research and awarenesses are rapidly changing that!

It turns out that not only IS the patient affected negatively if the surgeon choses raucous or too lively music (and yes, that does happen!) A surgical nurse locally told me that one surgeon regularly plays “Queen’s” song “Another One Bites the Dust” when he operates! I was appalled! On the other hand, surgeons and anesthesiologists are becoming aware that even when the patient is totally unconscious from the anesthesia and unable to “hear” technically, the slow, steady, pulsing of certain classical music can entrain or synchronize the person’s heartrate and breathing so that they stay more relaxed on the operating table with less anesthesia. Because they require less anesthesia to stay asleep, they awaken sooner and with less nausea, dizziness, “brain fog” and recover faster!

When the patient recovers faster, they are discharged from the hospital sooner, with fewer side effects, they get back to work and back to the lives sooner and the hospital can process more patients in one 24 hour period. So what’s the downside? We haven’t found anything yet.

Yes, you can create your own playlist of your favorite slow, steady music and download it to your own iPod to take into surgery….or you can get these really amazing lightweight, cordless headphones that have a built-in MP3 player, already loaded with “Surgical Serenity” music! Your choice! Click on the picture of the headphones or go to www.SurgicalHeadphones.com to learn more. You can also contact me at DrAlice@surgicalheadphones.com. Best wishes on your surgery.

Classical music ‘improves surgery’

Classical music could become a routine part of surgery, after a study found it helped to relax patients under local anaesthetic.

Surgeons believe playing a little knife music might benefit patients so much that they recover sooner from their operations.

Mozart was not actually one of the composers that those in the study got to hear. However, they were offered equally soothing pieces by Beethoven, Vivaldi and Bach.

Frank Sinatra was also on hand for those who preferred some easy listening during the operations, which included washing out major wounds.

Hazim Sadideen, the plastic surgeon who led the project at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, said: “Undergoing surgery can be a stressful experience for patients and finding ways of making them more comfortable should be our goal as clinicians.

“There are also good medical reasons – calmer patients may cope better with pain and recover quicker.

“This small scale work is the first time an attempt has been made to measure the impact music has in this specific group of patients and hints at the need for bigger multi-centre research to establish whether this should become part of standard practice.”

In the study, published in the journal Annals of the Royal College of Surgeons, 96 patients undergoing minor surgery were randomly assigned either music or silence. All were awake during their procedures, which included routine removal of skin lesions and cleansing of upper limb wounds after accidents.

The half played music reported lower anxiety levels and lower breathing rates than the others.

The medics did not evaluate whether Beethoven was better for patients than Bach.