The memory of beautiful music has lingering positive effects on patients.
In all cultures, music uplifts and calms the listener providing health benefits:

Cardiologist Dr. Raymond Bahr claims an hour of music produces the same effect as ten milligrams of valium.

The sounds of harp music comforts and soothes patients.  Recent studies by the International Harp Therapy Program found nearly 100% of patients reported anxiety relief and 72% found pain relief when harp music was part of their treatment. This relief also transfers to caregivers and family members! Harp Instead provides comfort to patients, caregivers and family.

A 2005 Norwegian study found that music "can enhance well-being and alleviate symptoms like agitation, anxiety, depression, and sensomotor symptoms in neurodegenerative diseases; it may also contribute in palliative care at the end-of-life stage." PDF (abstract)

Karen Allen, Ph.D. and her team of researchers at the University at Buffalo have shown that older adults who listened to their choice of music during outpatient eye surgery had significantly lower heart rate, blood pressure and cardiac work load than patients who did not listen to music. (Science Daily: May 29, 2001)

Oliver Sacks wrote in Awakenings, "The power of music to integrate and cure . . . is quite fundamental. [It is the] profoundest nonchemical medication."
 
Cardiac specialist Dr. Raymond Bahr (St. Agnes Hospital, Baltimore) claims that half an hour of music produces the same effect as ten milligrams of valium.

A Norwegian study found dementia patients less anxious and depressed when exposed to live music.

A French study of Alzheimer’s patients found music helped to improve patient’s mood, self-expression, mental processing, speech, sensory stimulation and motor skills.

Researchers  at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation found that music brought about a 21% reduction in pain levels as well as a 25% drop in depression linked to pain. Patients described their pain as less disabling when they received music therapy.
 
The Journal of Advanced Nursing reported in May 2006 that they found significant benefits in including music as part of therapy for the management of pain and depression.

Researchers at Case Western Reserve University's Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing and the Buddhist Tzu-Chi General Hospital in Taiwan studied the effects of music on sleep and learned that carefully chosen music bring about physical changes that aid in sleep. This is particularly helpful in patients experiencing trouble resting.

A recent Cochrane report found that live music engaged dementia patients 69% of the time where recorded music was found to be "non-harmful but less clearly beneficial". PMID: 16805928

Effects of Calming Music on the Level of Agitation in Cognitively Impaired Nursing Home Residents
Patricia A. Tabloski, PhD, CS; Leah McKinnon-Howe, MS, CS; Ruth Remington, MS, CS
American Journal of Alzheimer's Care and Related Disorders & Research, Jan/Feb '95


QUOTES/ABSTRACT
"Music therapy has proven itself to be a very effective modality for connecting with persons with dementia and enabling them to reach optimal levels of functioning and well-being."

"...repetitive behaviors such as 'picking at things' were significantly reduced in those who listened to music.  Subjects also had a decrease in the number of aggressive behaviors, strange noises, and attention seeking behaviors."

"...music is a battery charger for the brain, and patients will frequently begin to reminisce, and verbalize thoughts and feelings in ways thought to be long dormant."

This study examines the use of music as a strategy to decrease agitated behavior in cognitively impaired nursing home residents. Twenty agitated subjects, 68 to 84 years of age, were exposed to 15 minutes of calming music on two occasions. Agitated behavior scores were recorded before, during and after the musical intervention using the Agitated Behavior Scale. Results indicate that a statistically significant reduction in agitated behavior occurs both during and after the musical intervention. Calming music was shown to be an effective, nonpharmacologic strategy which nurses and other caregivers may use to reduce agitated behavior in the nursing home.


Effects of Music on Sleep in Healthy Elderly and Subjects with Senile Dementia of the Alzheimer Type
G.F. Lindenmuth, PhD; Manish Patel; P.K. Chang, PhD
American Journal of Alzheimer's Care and Related Disorders & Research, March/April '92

QUOTES/ABSTRACT

"Music of a serene nature has been shown to lessen anxiety and allow individuals to relax."

"...patients in the final stages can make contact through the means of music when everything else has failed..."

"...there are alternate ways of improving sleep for Alzheimer patients other than medication."

Alteration in sleep function of the elderly is associated with the aging process. Subjective sleep surveys of the elderly commonly reveal a general dissatisfaction with the quantity and quality of sleep. The widespread utilization of sedative-hypnotic drugs in order to alleviate the sleeping complaints of the elderly probably rests on some untested assumptions made byphysicians. Music has elicited some strong responses from subjects with Senile Dementia of the Alzheimer Type (SDAT), when other means of communication has failed. Music of a serene nature has been shown to lessen anxiety and allow individuals to relax. This study investigates music as an adjunct or alternative to sedate-hypnotic drugs in inducing sleep in "healthy" elderly subjects and patients with SDAT. A behavioral assessment chart of sleeping behavior was designed and utilized by nurses on the midnight shift. Combined analysis of variance for the number of hours asleep for all four groups yielded a significant relationship between the numbers of hours asleep and music. A paired comparison between control and experimental SDAT disclosed a significant relationship between the use of music and the number of hours of productive sleep. A paired comparison of the number of hours asleep between control and experimental "healthy" elderly revealed no significant relationship.

    

Influence of Dinner Music on Food Intake and Symptoms Common in Dementia
Hans Ragneskog, RNT; Gorel Brane, Reg. Psych., DMSc; Ingvar Karlsson, Associate Professor, MD, PhD; Mona Kihlgren, RN, PhD
(Scandinavian Journal of Caring Sciences, Vol. 10, 1996)

QUOTES/ABSTRACT

"...whereas language deterioration in patients with Alzheimer's disease is a feature of deficit, musical ability appears to be preserved."

"Music is likely to reach the brain by pathways other than speech and may therefore enhance the patients' ability to interpret the environment correctly."

"Human beings are affected by their environment; in domains other than medical care, such as supermarkets and restaurants, it is a matter of course to use music to develop a relaxed milieu for the customers."

The influence of dinner music on food intake and symptoms common in dementia such as depressed mood, irritability and restlessness was studied. The study was carried out in a nursing home ward in Sweden. Soothing music was played as dinner music for two weeks. Swedish tunes from the 1920s and 1930s for two weeks and pop music for two weeks. Prior to these periods, there was one week without music, and at the end of the intervention there was a two-week control period. The effects of the intervention were assessed by psychological ratings and by weighing the food helpings. It was found that during all three music periods the patients ate more in total. The difference was particularly significant for the dessert. The staff were thought to be influenced by the music, as they served the patients more food, both main course and dessert, whenever music was played. The patients were less irritable, anxious and depressed during the music periods. The results of the study suggest that dinner music, particularly soothing music, can reduce irritability, fear-panic and depressed mood and can stimulate demented patients in a nursing home ward into eating more.


 Research on the web:
    Music Conquers Time at Nursing Home: New York Times article PDF
    Boston Globe article
    Cool Tunes Ease Cold Weather Blues
    Therapeutic Harp Program
    The Effects of Music on Pain Perception
    Is Music Neutral?
    Music Eases Perception Of Chronic Pain
    Music Hath Charms to Soothe Chronic Nonmalignant Pain
    Music improves sleep quality in older adults, researchers find
    Listening To Music Of Choice During Outpatient Eye Surgery Lowers Patients' Cardiovascular, Emotional Stress
    Harpist Soothes Patients
    Harpist Performs at University Hospital
    Music Therapy Offers Soothing Help
    Healing Harps and Lyme Disease in Illinois
    Premature babies respond positively to the chords of harpist
    The Healing Sound of Music: Incredible Benefits of Music