Resources & references

This article analyzes the effect of music therapy on preterm infants and their parents during NICU hospitalization and after discharge from the hospital. Overall, it found that it significantly  lowered  infant breathing rate and reduced maternal anxiety, but there was not enough evidence to draw any further conclusions.

 Music therapy improves the health of premature babies and boosts parental bonding.

Click here to watch a video about this article. 

Music therapist Amy Rodgers Smith offers music therapy to premature babies to promote relaxation, cognitive stimulation, and positive interaction. Music therapy professor Darcy Deloach also highlights the use of pacifier activated music to support feeding.

Music therapists at the Montreal Children's Hospital explain how they use musical experiences to help babies, children, and adolscents with various needs express emotions, self-regulate, enhance relaxation, build social skills, and improve motor skills.

Read an article exploring the use of music therapy in a neonatal intensive care (NICU) setting to support premature babies' neurobehavioural development. Results found that babies who received MT were better able to maintain self-regulation during social interaction with an adult, were less irritable and cried less, and were more positive in their response to adult handling.

Learn what medical music therapy is, how it is applied in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), and how it benefits both premature infants and their families.

Read an article detailing the work of Rebecca Lappa, a music therapy masters student, who, having just completed a trial program with a hospital for her final practicum is now working with the hospital to find funding for a longer term project. She explains the ways that music therapy helps babies in the NICU, and also shares that she was a NICU baby herself.

This article explores the use of music therapy in neonatal intensive care units (NICUs), highlighting how live, personalized music can support infant development, reduce parental anxiety, and strengthen parent–infant bonding. It examines the “song of kin” approach, using parent-selected songs to provide individualized, culturally meaningful support for infants and families.

This article explores how music therapy fosters parent-infant bonding and strengthens parental identity, highlighting how parents learn to read their babies’ cues. Findings reveal factors that support or hinder musical interaction with premature infants in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).

Read an article on the use of music therapy for non-intubated premature babies in a level 3 neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) setting. Results demonstrated significant decrease in distress and heart rate and increase in oxygen saturation levels after a single 15-minute music therapy session. Reflections on the potential role of music therapy on breathing as a primary rehabilitation focus for neonates is also discussed.

Discover how music therapy in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) supports premature infants and their families by promoting relaxation, stabilizing vital signs, fostering development, and strengthening parent–infant bonding.

Click here to watch a video that discusses this story further.

A mother in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) shares how music therapy comforted her baby, while therapist Hannah Mata explains her work and how it helps infants regulate, relax, and improve vital signs.