Positive effect

Nursing home NürnbergStift

The study showed that inmuRELAX had positive effect in 85% of cases where it was used. The effect was more calm and peaceful residents.

The staff was also asked to evaluate the inmu. They concluded that inmuRELAX is a good tool for everyday care and to ease challenging situations. Especially when the inmu is used regularly.

Nursing home DIAKONEO

Saw positiv effect in 65% of cases where inmuRELAX was used. All residents had dementia and more than one behavioral challenge. The observed positiv effects includes that residents was calmed down, improved feeling of safety, relaxation or fell asleep. 

Background for the study

The goal with the project was to test

•  if patients would accept the inmuRELAX
• if restless patients would be more calm when using an inmuRELAX
• if patients would fall asleep easier and sleep all night.

For the staff the goal was to test if the inmuRELAX used regularly would ease everyday situations or make nursing interventions and challenging situations easier.

The study was carried out over a period of 6 weeks at two nursing homes (NürnbergStift and DIAKONEO). 8 people pariciapated from NürnbergStift and 14 from DIAKONEO. Staff had got a short online training before start of the study.

The project was carried out in cooperation with research institute IDC of the SRH – Wilhelm Löhe University and the research institute IREM of the University of Würzburg-Schweinfurt.

Positive effect

The study showed that approx. 80% of the participants had their quality of life improved by using inmuRELAX. In particular, it proved good at calming motor restlessness, irritation, and extroverted behavior.

Download the report: inmu-evaluation-report(2020-05)

Read also:

Large study proves the effect of inmuRELAX in dementia care

Positive development

In two out of three people with dementia, the study showed positive results from using the inmu as part of daily care routines. It is an effect that, according to the participating care facilities, was expected to increase, had the project been allowed to continue for a longer period.

50 participants

The pilot project is based on data collected from 50 people with dementia living at eleven different Danish care facilities in ten municipalities over a period of four weeks.

That makes the pilot project one of the most comprehensive studies of the correlation between musical stimulation and dementia. It is notoriously difficult to conduct this kind of empirical study on the effectiveness of care tools on people with dementia, because the disease affects and progresses uniquely from person to person.

Goals

The main goal of the pilot project was to “investigate the basis and necessity for developing new tools and methods that are simple to implement into preventive nursing and social pedagogical care practices for people with dementia.”

Moreover, the pilot project investigated how easy the inmu was to implement into existing social pedagogical care methods, such as the “common third” and the “contact island”. “Common third” is a method that uses an object of interest to strengthen social interaction between two or more people who have trouble relating to each other.

Many people with dementia quickly get overstimulated by physical touch. “Contact Island” is the term for a daily recurring contact-promoting activity between resident (patient) and staff. It can also be an object that can be used as a “safe thing”, for example in daily care. When the “contact island” or the thing is being used, the person knows what is going to happen, e.g. dressing or undressing.

Music and dementia

The pilot project is a continuation of research gathered by Danish and international studies on the beneficial relationship between music and dementia.

One of the leading researchers on the effect of music on the brain is professor in musical therapy at Aalborg University, Denmark, Hanne Mette Ochsner Ridder. In her book Musik og Demens (2005), she describes the relationship between music and the brain:

“Music reduces agitated behaviour, anxiety, apathy, and depression, as well as raising cognitive and social skills and willingness to cooperate and share with others, when used in interdisciplinary contexts in relation to care situations or other forms of musical activities or treatments using musical therapy.”

Recommendations

The pilot project recommends that the inmu should be implemented over a longer period of time. During this period the care professionals should be personally involved in introducing the inmu into the specific daily care routines of the person with dementia.