This article summarizes the current scientific knowledge on foetal and newborn neurological development and related research on beneficial uses of music with the premature infant. As technology and science advance, the survival rate of earlier and earlier premature birth increases with long-term implications for these children having impaired neurological development, delayed growth, and need for special education. Research in the neonatal intensive care unit has focused on uses of music to reduce stress, to promote homeostasis and weight gain, to reinforce non-nutritive sucking, to enhance developmental maturation, and to shorten length of hospitalization. Further, it is theorized that music benefits documented for full term newborns may also apply to the premature infant, i.e., lullabies promote language development; familiar music is recognized, reinforcing, and comforting; and infants orient to and avidly attend to music more so than other auditory stimuli. This burgeoning area of research provides exciting possibilities for the practice of music therapy in the neonatal intensive care unit and for music education in early childhood.
Anesthesia and long-term outcomes after neonatal intensive care
