The Sandyford-based service helps people with Parkinson’s on several levels – psychological, informational, as well as with their speech and mobility issues.
A Dublin-based music therapy service will have a free workshop for those affected by Parkinson’s disease, ahead of Parkinson’s Awareness Day next Tuesday.
Neurolinks Music Therapy are collaborating with Ireland’s largest Parkinson’s charity Move4Parkinson’s, who are organising a free workshop from 2-5pm on Friday April 28 in Killiney. Attendees will get the chance to experience some of the techniques they commonly use at the service.
Leading Neurological Music Therapist Dr Shane Cassidy told Dublin Live their service helps people with Parkinson’s on several levels – psychological, informational, as well as with their speech and mobility issues. He said: “A lot of people have become very isolated as a result of this diagnosis, which is horrendous, because of mobility issues.”
His service does one-on-one sessions, group work, and they also do some outreach work with various hospitals, day facilities and charities. He added: “We recently had a group and there were a number of recently diagnosed people and it was a clear support for them – to be able to share the emotional side of things as well, and be in a safe space with a qualified therapist to kind of process and work through that life-changing diagnosis.”
The service incorporates music rhythms in their therapy to help with the changes in the walk that people with Parkinson’s would start experiencing. He said: “The length of their strides will become shortened and therefore they have this inclination then to speed their rate of walking, even though it’s smaller steps.
“And that comes with a risk then of falls and of course fractures and everything that goes along with falls. In that case, we’re using rhythm to elongate the strides, and it’s acting as a template for steps and working on increasing their gait speed.”
Their speech is also impacted. People with Parkinson’s experience reduced volume of their voice, they might also tend to rush their words and their articulation is lost, Dr Cassidy said.
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