Increased Functional Connectivity After Listening to Favored Music in Adults With Alzheimer Dementia

Journal

Journal of Prevention of Alzheimer's Disease

Year

2019

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Personalized music programs have been proposed as an adjunct therapy for patients with Alzheimer disease related dementia, and multicenter trials have now demonstrated improvements in agitation, anxiety, and behavioral symptoms. Underlying neurophysiological mechanisms for these effects remain unclear. METHODS: We examined 17 individuals with a clinical diagnosis of Alzheimer disease related dementia using functional MRI following a training period in a personalized music listening program. RESULTS: We find that participants listening to preferred music show specific activation of the supplementary motor area, a region that has been associated with memory for familiar music that is typically spared in early Alzheimer disease. We also find widespread increases in functional connectivity in corticocortical and corticocerebellar networks following presentation of preferred musical stimuli, suggesting a transient effect on brain function. CONCLUSIONS: Findings support a mechanism whereby attentional network activation in the brain's salience network may lead to improvements in brain network synchronization.

Music and Health Institute Terms

Agitation; Alzheimer's and Related Dementias; Anxiety; Behavioral Scales; Cognitive Abilities; Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI); Memory; Music Listening; Neurodegenerative Disorders

Indexed Terms

Acoustic Stimulation; Elderly; Alzheimer Disease; Auditory Perception; Brain; Cerebellum; Cerebral Cortex; Dementia; Functional Neuroimaging; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Motor Cortex; Neural Pathways; Personalized music; dementia; fMRI; functional connectivity; supplementary motor area

Study Type

Quasi-Experimental Study; Quantitative Methods

PubMed ID

30569087

Document Type

Article

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