Summary Of The Movie 'Alive Inside'

A dormant eighty-five-year-old Alzheimer's patient sits in a wheelchair in his nursing home where he has resided for the past 15 years. His full and eventful life has come to a halt as his alzheimer's began to progress rapidly. His love of music, which began as a child and carried over into his adulthood, has vanished, or so it seemed. Until one day a music therapist came into the nursing home and placed a pair of headphones that were connected to an iPod, over the resident’s ears which were then filled with music that brought back his memories of his life before the disease and caused the patient to begin to twitch and jerk with joy. This is a synopsis of a small portion of, “Alive Inside,” a film created to show the way music and music therapy …show more content…
For instance, “It is comforting to believe that songs can help dementia patients recall their lost selves, but music can also harm as much as it helps, creating false memories, confusion, and distress” (Swayne). This negative effect is based off the mind, such as confusion or distress, while other negative effects can be based off the body such as injury or harm to oneself. “Dementia patients’ inability to consent and their confused responses lead to yet another reason to tread carefully in this area: the potential for injury” (Swayne). From my introduction, the alzheimer’s patient who began to move around with joy, may have been able to accidentally hurt himself if he had fallen out of his wheelchair or maybe suffered from a heart attack at the increase of physical activity. On the same note, music therapy can also be dangerous if provided by a non-qualified individual. For example, from an article about the dangers of music therapy, “I was working in a major children’s hospital when one of the PICU doctors called me in to consult on a case. There was a young teenager who ran his snowmobile into a tree and suffered a traumatic brain injury. He was in a stage of coma where he was extremely agitated. His parents consulted with someone who claimed to be a music therapist but was not. That person programmed music for them to play at their child’s bedside to help him relax. The result of that music was increased agitation, increased heart rate (to dangerous levels), and decreased oxygen saturation rates. This necessitated increased sedation medication which can have negative side effects” (Lillieth). Due to an unqualified individual administering music therapy for a patient, the patient was then put at an unnecessary risk which caused complications with the healing process. Music therapy is a wonderful tool to use when looking for a less