Dual-Task-Based Music Therapy to Improve Executive Functioning of Elderly Patients with Early Stage Alzheimer’s Disease: A Multiple Case Study

Abstract

Deficits in executive functioning are a common feature of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and result from impairment in the central executive system. As a result, elderly patients with early stage AD may require interventions that are more cognitively intense than traditional interventions. To address this need, in this multiple case study, we explored a dual-task-based music therapy intervention that involved drum playing and singing designed to induce attentional and motor controls. Three octogenarians diagnosed with early stage AD participated in 12 dual-task-based music therapy sessions over 6 weeks. Measures of executive functioning and the performance of a bimanual drum tapping task were evaluated before and after the intervention. Improvements in executive functioning were observed for participants A and C. After the intervention, reduced mean synchronization errors were found for the simultaneous tapping condition for all three participants. Although there was variability in the functional changes between participants, it is noteworthy that positive improvements in the elderly patients with early stage AD were obtained following dual-task-based music therapy. The results suggest that music therapy integrated into the dual-task paradigm can be an effective way to address degenerative cognitive deficits among elderly patients with early stage AD.

Body percussion and urban rhythms as an interdisciplinary resource

“…By way of conclusion, we can argue that dual task work where we involve both a motor task with a cognitive task can help cognitive stimulation following the latest neurological publications [11][12][13][14].…”

“…Neuromotricity is an excellent tool, given that it implements in its essence, rhythmic motor activities with the aim of working, certain cognitive and executive functions on the basis of dual-task. The existing literature demonstrates very positive effects, both in young and healthy older adults as well as with cognitive impairment [9][10][11][12][13][14].…”

“…There is an abundant scientific literature on the positive use of dual-tasking while walking or moving in space in both healthy individuals and those with some disease or illness [15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25]. Regarding the implementation of rhythmic activities coupled with the subject's gait, studies argue a clear improvement [11,12,13,14,26,27,28,29]. The Bapne method has a concrete protocol of highly sequenced activities with the aim of working the dual task through rhythm in which it includes displacement and praxias .…”

Estudio Piloto de la Evaluación de la Ansiedad y la Atención a través de la Percusión Corporal y Neuromotricidad en Alumnado de Secundaria en las clases de Educación Física, Música y Artes plásticas (Pilot Study of the Assessment of Anxiety and Attention through Body Percussion and Neuromotricity in Secondary School Students in Physical Education, Music and Visual Arts classes)

“…In recent years, Korean researchers have studied this line of research extensively, creating a new paradigm whose article entitled The applicability of rhythm-motor tasks to a new dual task paradigm for older adults provides a fourth paradigm in which rhythmic aspects are involved, a line in which the BAPNE method has always worked (Kim et al, 2017a(Kim et al, , 2017b(Kim et al, , 2022. Regarding the performance of rhythmic activities related to the subject's gait, studies have investigated this in more depth (Kim et al, 2017a(Kim et al, , 2017b(Kim et al, , 2022Loehrer et al, 2016;Montero-Odasso et al, 2012;Oh & Chong, 2016;Patel et al, 2014;Schrodt, et al, 2004).…”

Practice of BAPNE FIT to Improve Cardiorespiratory Fitness

“…There are three classic paradigms in dual-task work: motor-motor, cognitive-cognitive and motor-cognitive [10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20]. Recent publications by Korean researchers provide a fourth paradigm, called rhythmic-motor [21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28]. On the other hand, in the BAPNE method we propose a possible fifth paradigm, called rhythmic-motorcognitive .…”