A 10-week group music therapy project was designed to determine whether music therapy influenced quality of life and social anxiety for people with a severe and enduring mental illness living in the community. Ten one-hour weekly sessions including song singing, song writing and improvisation, culminated in each group recording original song/s in a professional studio. The principal outcome measure was the WHOQOLBREF Quality of Life (QoL) Scale; other instruments used were the Social Interaction Anxiety Scale (SIAS) and the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI). Qualitative data were gathered through focus group interviews and an analysis of lyric themes. Statistically significant improvement was found on five items of the QoL Scale. There were no changes on the BSI indicating that QoL improvement was not mediated by symptomatic change. Themes from the focus groups were: music therapy gave joy and pleasure, working as a team was beneficial, participants were pleasantly surprised at their creativity, and they took pride in their song. An analysis of song lyrics resulted in 6 themes: a concern for the world, peace and the environment; living with mental illness is difficult; coping with mental illness requires strength; religion and spirituality are sources of support; living in the present is healing; and working as a team is enjoyable.

J Music Ther. 2009 Summer;46(2):90-104. Grocke D, Bloch S, Castle D. The University of Melbourne, St Vincent's Hospital.

Objective: The present study was designed to test the hypotheses that response expectancies and emotional distress mediate the effects of an empirically validated presurgical hypnosis intervention on postsurgical side effects (i.e., pain, nausea, and fatigue). Method: Women (n = 200) undergoing breast-conserving surgery (mean age = 48.50 years; 63% White, 15% Hispanic, 13% African American, and 9% other) were randomized to a hypnosis or to an attention control group. Prior to surgery, patients completed assessments of hypothesized mediators (response expectancies and emotional distress), and following surgery, patients completed assessments of outcome variables (pain, nausea, and fatigue). Results: Structural equation modeling revealed the following: (a) Hypnotic effects on postsurgical pain were partially mediated by pain expectancy (p < .0001) but not by distress (p = .12); (b) hypnotic effects on postsurgical nausea were partially mediated by presurgical distress (p = .02) but not by nausea expectancy (p = .10); and (c) hypnotic effects on postsurgical fatigue were partially mediated by both fatigue expectancy (p = .0001) and presurgical distress (p = .02). Conclusions: The results demonstrate the mediational roles of response expectancies and emotional distress in clinical benefits associated with a hypnotic intervention for breast cancer surgical patients. More broadly, the results improve understanding of the underlying mechanisms responsible for hypnotic phenomena and suggest that future hypnotic interventions target patient expectancies and distress to improve postsurgical recovery. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2009 APA, all rights reserved).

J Consult Clin Psychol. 2010 Feb;78(1):80-8. Montgomery GH, Hallquist MN, Schnur JB, David D, Silverstein JH, Bovbjerg DH. Integrative Behavioral Medicine Program.