Music in the Emergency Department (ED)

Columbia University

Status: Completed

Conditions: Anxiety

Treatments: Other: Music

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT03047915

AAAQ3016

Details and patient eligibility

About

This will be a randomized controlled study evaluating the effect of a music-listening intervention compared to standard care (control) during patient visit to the emergency department (ED). Randomization will be done with consecutive sealed envelopes.

Data collection will be prospective with administration of the State Trait Anxiety Inventory and collection of physiologic parameters (pain level, heart rate, blood pressure). Retrospective data will also be collected for covariate analysis (age, race/ethnicity, emergency severity index (ESI), pain medications administered during the ED visit, pain scores throughout ED visit, chief complaint, and ED discharge diagnosis).

Full description

A visit to the emergency department (ED) is anxiety provoking for patients by nature. Contributing factors may include the sudden timing of the visit, a noisy environment, and waiting in anticipation of a serious diagnosis or bad news. Studies suggest that nearly 75% of adult ED patients may experience mild to severe anxiety in relation to the ED visit, but not directly related to their chief complaint. Anxiety can have deleterious effects on a patient in the clinical setting. Patients may report excessive pain complaints and manifest the typical signs and symptoms of anxiety (e.g. anorexia, dry mouth, nausea, chest pain), which can complicate diagnosis. Patient anxiety can also impose barriers to communication with ED staff, hindering successful delivery of important medical information. A visit to the ED may be particularly distressing for older adults (age 65+), for they are more likely than younger adults to have a greater ED length of stay before discharge home, receive more diagnostic tests and venipuncture for intravenous (IV) access, and have poorer pain care. Music listening as an anxiolytic has been shown to be effective across a variety of clinical settings, however there is a relative paucity of published data on the use of music listening for adult patients in the ED. No published studies, to the investigators' knowledge, have evaluated the effect of music listening on older adults in the ED.

Enrollment: 169 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 65+ years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Present to the ED
• Aged 65 or over
• Speak English or Spanish

Exclusion criteria

• Individuals who are deaf
• Prisoners
• Individuals who cannot give informed consent

Trial design

Primary purpose: Prevention

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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169 participants in 2 patient groups

Control Group

No Intervention group

Description:

All subjects enrolled will respond to questions assessing anxiety using the State Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI), and pain using a 1-10 numerical score, and will have blood pressure and heart rate taken. Subjects randomized to the control group will continue the ED visit as usual.

Music Group

Experimental group

Description:

All subjects enrolled will respond to questions assessing anxiety using the State Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI), and pain using a 1-10 numerical score, and will have blood pressure and heart rate taken. Subjects who are randomized to receive a music-listening intervention will listen to a choice of music for 30 to 60 minutes on a loaned iPad with disposable headphones. An hour after enrollment, participants will be asked the same questions assessing anxiety and pain, and will also have blood pressure and heart rate taken again.

Treatment:

Other: Music