Listening to music could be instrumental in preventing people admitted to Intensive Care Units (ICU) from developing delirium, according to one researcher with IU Health’s Regenstrief Institute.
A small pilot phase recently came back with positive results. They plan to start recruiting subjects for a larger, confirmatory study in February.
Dr. Babar Khan is Leading the first study to see whether listening to music can prevent development of delirium. He’s working with older patients who’ve been admitted to an Intensive Care Unit and put on a breathing machine.
“So when people get sick, they get admitted to the ICU most of the people we end up putting on breathing machines because they cannot breathe by themselves," Khan says. "So when they’re on mechanical ventilators and they are super sick, somehow they develop this form of acute brain failure called delirium.”
Delirium is a form of acute brain failure. Khan says close to half of people admitted to the ICU are put on a ventilator machine. Of those, 80 percent will develop delirium, something he sees as a serious concern.
“When you develop delirium in the ICU, you tend to stay longer in the ICU and you have less chances of going back home and more chances of going to a nursing home or a rehab facility if you’re in the ICU," he says. "The second other very important factor is when you develop delirium in the Intensive Care Unit, the chances of you developing dementia once you get out of the ICU rises quite a bit."
Khan says around 33 percent of patients put on a breathing machine in the ICU develop dementia in the three years after being treated.
He says the goal of the study was to find an easy to implement solution that wouldn’t have unforeseen consequences to patients.
“The beauty of using music in the ICU is once we complete the study and confirm the results of our pilot, this could be easily implemented at any of the ICU," Khan says.
The study uses two groups, one receiving music for two hours a day, and another group that doesn't.
The study will run for the next five years. Khan says his goal is to get patients treatment for one health problem without creating another.
“We would like to have an ICU when you get admitted, you get taken care of and you would not be worried about developing dementia in the long term," he says.
