Six-year-old Ramon Ayungua has a jack-o-lantern smile and a gravelly little voice that hints at his cystic fibrosis condition. He’s small for his age, but give him a brightly-colored xylophone, a couple mallets and a familiar tune and he turns into Ringo Starr, laying down the beat and staying mostly in tune with the guitar-led version of Phillip Phillips’ “Gone, Gone, Gone.”
Music Therapist Trysha Lucero provides lead guitar and vocals while Ramon’s brother, David, 9, and his sister Blanca, 13, enthusiastically play back-up drums in Ramon’s room at Valley Children’s Hospital.
The song lyrics are especially fitting: “When enemies are at your door / I’ll carry you away from war / If you need help, if you need help. / Your hope dangling by a string, / I’ll share in your suffering / To make you well, to make you well.”
Today, the enemies of fear and pain are not close at hand for Ramon, but it’s not always this way. Shortly after he was born, Ramon was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis, a Ramongenetic disorder that creates thick, sticky mucus which clogs air passageways and interferes with digestion. There is no cure, only management. Ramon, who lives in Orange Cove, is at Valley Children’s frequently, two weeks at a time, for chest and breathing therapy and, thanks to a new program in the Hospital’s Child Life Department, he participates in music therapy as well.
Child Life provides education, play and emotional support for patients and their families. Child Life specialists help children of all ages cope with hospitalization through creative play, educational activities, and events such as bingo and holiday-themed parties. All services are free, including music therapy.
Lucero holds a degree in family and child psychology and a master’s degree in music therapy. She provides music therapy part time for both Valley Children’s and Hinds Hospice. However, funding for the Hospital’s program depends entirely on donations. Despite proven results and patient satisfaction, funding is dwindling, said Mary Beth Jones, Child Life supervisor.
Music therapy can be used in many different ways, said Lucero. It can range from passive listening to drumming, singing and movement to music. Some children use lyric analysis and songwriting to cope with pain, fear or loss. Entrainment, a body’s response to an external rhythm, can be used to calm all ages from jittery newborns to anxious teens. For some, like Ramon, music can also be used for attention-span development, creative expression and socialization, she said.
Ramon knows Lucero as the music lady or music teacher but what she does is much more impactful than just playing or even teaching music.
“We use music for non-musical purposes. There is always a clinical goal in mind,” said Lucero. After a Child Life specialist refers patients who are clinically appropriate for the program, Lucero assesses the patient, creates goals for them and arranges the appropriate musical interventions to achieve those goals.
The most common use for music therapy is helping patients to cope with long hospitalizations or difficult diagnoses. Music therapy can be used for emotional support (anxiety about a procedure, depression over a diagnosis, grief from losing a loved one) or physical rehabilitation (the ukulele provides enjoyable, finger-strengthening exercises and a harmonica jam session can be used for breathing therapy, in and out).
Singing is particularly useful not only for breathing but also for speech therapy; some patients find they can sing when speech fails them. And for patients who are too withdrawn to be effectively reached by traditional counseling methods, lyric analysis and music and songwriting can be an avenue for expression.
“The lyrics for a song for a patient can serve as a medium or ‘door’ into their emotional psyche,” said Lucero. “It can tell the story of how the patient might be feeling or how they look at their life.”
“A lot of kids who don’t open up to anybody else, will open up to music therapy,” said Jones. “It gives you goose bumps.”
For example, a patient who has experienced multiple hospitalizations uses music therapy to express his feelings regarding his diagnosis and the loss of a close family member through writing rap songs.
Music crosses all boundaries and departments at the Hospital. “The ICU nurses love her (Lucero),” said Jones, explaining that Lucero uses guided imagery and music to teach children that the brain can override a lot of pain signals.
“The kids we see get out a lot quicker than the kids we don’t see,” said Jones, adding that if the program can minimize the trauma, the kids aren’t afraid to come back for future procedures.
Entertainment is also used for coma or brain injury patients or patients too tiny to speak of their anxiety or pain. The vibrations caused by a gently strummed guitar or beaten drum can slow down a racing heart rate, promote relaxation and relieve anxiety. In fact, the heart rate will align itself to the rhythm in response to the vibrations. Conversely, music can increase stimulation, especially useful for babies who need a little help suckling.
Lucero also uses music with environmental sounds like waves or gentle breezes to block out noises. “There is a lot of stress associated with sounds of the hospital,” she said.
Finally, playing music is just fun. Ramon, with his stuffed Ninja turtle beside him, is now beating a drum shaped and colored like a lollipop. His mom, Maria, through an interpreter, says that after his music sessions, Ramon is happier. “When he knows he is going to have something done, he is more anxious but he is more content now with music,” she said.
“It makes my hands sweaty,” Ramon said, “but I’m happy.”
And the Phillip Phillips song continues: “Like a drum, baby, don’t stop beating. / Like a drum, my heart never stops beating / For you, for you.”