Dementia patients at University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust (UHB) have been banging the drum for a new project which is helping to deliver Dignity in Care.

A music therapist is visiting UHB with the aim of encouraging elderly or dementia patients to communicate through sound and song.

The 12-week pilot project has been organised and funded by Birmingham Centre for Arts Therapies in conjunction with the hospital trust’s Dignity in Care team.

And, according to staff, the weekly sessions with music therapist Alex Lowman are already hitting the right note with patients.

Darren Pratley, Activities Coordinator at UHB, said: “I was contacted by one of our health educators, Phil Walshe, and asked if we would like to do a trial project with Alex.

“I had already seen something about music therapy during an all-day event at Worcester University and thought that was something I wanted to try here.

“The instruments are pretty basic, but it is certainly working very well with the patients. The sessions tend to start pretty quietly but the patients gradually start using the instruments, or will even start to sing.

“And Alex, who is not costing us anything over the 12 weeks, is very good and will pick up on a tune even if they start humming something, and then accompany them on the keyboard.”

The number of patients taking part in the music therapy sessions, which are held on Harborne Ward in the old QE Hospital, has varied since the project began, but has been as high as 20.

Alex, who also teaches flute and piano, has been involved in music therapy for 13 years after obtaining a social sciences degree. She works for the Birmingham Centre for Arts Therapies, based in Moseley Road, Highgate, on a self-employed basis.

She said: “Music therapy is all about trying to communicate and build a relationship with the patients using music as the primary means.

“With dementia patients you are looking at improving awareness of others, looking at some level of response and shared activity, which might be through singing a familiar song. They are more likely to remember that than something recent.”