Music may enhance the effect of pain relievers
Bob Marley once said, "One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain." A recent study using a mouse model backs up Marley's musing with some scientific data.
In the past, scientists have explored the idea of using music as a therapy in a variety of ways.
One study revealed that joining a choir might improve the lives of people with Parkinson's disease, for instance.
Other studies have investigated music as a potential treatment for epilepsy.
Others still have concluded that music, in the right setting, can reduce the sensation of pain.
For instance, one recent meta-analysis of 14 studies concludes that "music may be beneficial as an adjuvant for chronic pain patients, as it reduces self-reported pain and its common comorbidities."
With the opioid crisis in full flow, finding ways to enhance the effectiveness of less addictive pain medication without producing side effects would be game-changing.
A new study reopens the investigation and retests the power of music — in combination with four different medications — against two models of pain in mice.
The researchers, from the University of Utah Health in Salt Lake City, have published their findings in the journal Frontiers in Neurology.
Music vs. pain
The researchers used two pain models: the carrageenan model, which mimics inflammation-related pain; and plantar incision, which replicates surgical pain.
They split the mice into two groups of five to eight animals. They exposed the control group to only ambient noise, while they played the experimental group three 3-hour segments of Mozart each day for 3 weeks.
Interestingly, the researchers did not choose the segments of music at random. As Grzegorz Bulaj, Ph.D. — an associate professor in medicinal chemistry — explains:
"Music is like DNA. We had musicians analyze sequences of several Mozart pieces to optimize the playlist. This was exciting but challenging to integrate these musical analyses into neuropharmacology."
They ran the study four times, each time using a different drug that can reduce pain. These drugs were ibuprofen, cannabidiol, levetiracetam, and a galanin analog called NAX 5055.
Both the control and the music groups received doses considered suboptimal.
The ibuprofen trials produced the most striking results. In the group that listened to music, pain responses in the carrageenan model dropped by 93 percent, compared with the mice that took ibuprofen but did not listen to music.
Also, in the carrageenan model, music and cannabidiol reduced swelling by 21 percent. NAX 5055 plus music reduced swelling by 9 percent. In the surgical pain model, music also significantly reduced some but not all responses to pain.
"There is emerging evidence that music interventions can alleviate pain when administered either alone or in combination with other therapies. I was particularly excited to see reduced swelling in the inflammatory pain model."
-First study author Cameron S. Metcalf, Ph.D.
Metcalf goes on to explain that standard inflammation medications do not produce such a quick response.
