Non-pharmacologic and pharmacologic treatments for anxiety in long-term care: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Understanding the Barriers to and Facilitators of Anxiety Management in Residents of Long-Term Care

Older adults, 65 years of age and older, living in long-term care (LTC) commonly experience anxiety. This study aimed to understand care providers' perspectives on the barriers to and facilitators of managing anxiety in residents of LTC. Ten semi-structured interviews with care providers in LTC were completed. Framework analysis methods were used to code, thematically analyze, designate codes as barriers or facilitators, and map the codes to the Theoretical Domains Framework. Themes were categorized as acting at the resident, provider, or system level, and were labelled as either barriers to or facilitators of anxiety care. Key barriers to anxiety care at each level were resident cognitive impairment or co-morbidities; lack of staff education, staff treatment uptake and implementation; as well as the care delivery environment and access to resources. There is a need to prioritize measurement-based care for anxiety, have increased access to non-pharmacological treatments, and have a care delivery environment that supports anxiety management to improve the care for anxiety that is delivered to residents.

Music Intervention for older adults: Evidence Map of Systematic Reviews

BACKGROUND

With the increasing aging population, the health problems of the elderly have received increasing attention. As a non-pharmacological interventions, music intervention has been widely used in clinical practice to improve the physical and mental health of the elderly. This article aims to provide a comprehensive review of existing systematic reviews on the health effects of music interventions for older adults in clinical practice.

METHODS

The study utilized the evidence map methodology, which involved identifying all relevant systematic reviews, meta-analysis from 7 electronic databases from their inception to November 2022. The studies were analyzed using AMSTAR 2.

RESULTS

The researchers identified 67 studies, with the majority published in the past 5 years. The effects of music interventions were categorized into 4 groups of health outcomes: positive (58 results), potentially positive (4 results), inconclusive (2 results), and no effect (3 results). The health outcomes were further classified into 5 groups: psychological well-being, cognitive functioning, physiological responses, quality of life, and overall well-being.

CONCLUSIONS

The study revealed that music interventions for older adults can have positive or potentially positive effects on health outcomes, encompassing psychological well-being, cognitive functioning, physiological responses, quality of life, and overall well-being. However, some studies yielded inconclusive or no effect. The study offers valuable insights for healthcare professionals and serves as a visual resource to access evidence-based information on the use of music interventions in promoting health and addressing various conditions in older adults.

Group-based active artistic interventions for adults with primary anxiety and depression: a systematic review

OBJECTIVES

This systematic review examined the potential benefit of all group-based performing arts interventions for primary anxiety and/or depression.

SETTING

Scholarly literature from any country or countries globally.

DATA SOURCES

Three key bibliographic databases, Google Scholar and relevant citation chasing.

PRIMARY AND SECONDARY OUTCOME MEASURES

Depression and/or anxiety symptom severity, well-being, quality of life, functional communication or social participation.

RESULTS

Database searches returned a total of 63 678 records, of which 56 059 remained following dededuplication. From these database searches, a total of 153 records proceeded to full-text screening. These were supplemented by 18 additional unique full-text screening records from Google Scholar searches and citation chasing (12% of total). From a total of 171 records at the full-text screening stage, 12 publications (7%) were eligible for inclusion in this systematic review, each reporting on a separate study. Published from 2004 to 2021, these studies involved a total of 669 participants with anxiety and/or depression from nine countries and covered five broad artistic modalities: dance, music therapy, art therapy, martial arts and theatre. Dance was the most studied artistic modality (five studies), while there were three studies on art therapy, two on music therapy and one each on martial arts and theatre. The evidence was clearest for a benefit of arts therapies on depression and/or anxiety symptoms.

CONCLUSIONS

This systematic review addresses all group-based active arts interventions in a focused population of primary anxiety and/or depression. The evidence suggests that the arts may be a useful therapeutic medium in this population. However, a substantial limitation of the evidence base is the lack of studies directly comparing different artistic modalities. Moreover, not all artistic modalities were assessed for all outcome domains. Therefore, it is not currently possible to determine which artistic modalities are most beneficial for which specific outcomes.