Like so many other interesting conversations on public radio, I happened to jump in the middle of a conversation about music therapy on Science Friday this afternoon. A caller mentioned how music therapy had helped two of her autistic sons...both non-verbal. Unfortunately, the therapy is not covered by most insurance companies.
There was a good exchange on Music Therapy for children with autism and on why insurance companies do not cover the therapy.
Joke Bradt is an associate professor in the Creative Arts Therapies Department at Drexel University in Philadelphia explained: Sure. I think, unfortunately, in this era of evidence-based practice where evidence really drives our health care industry, as well as our funding and reimbursement industry, we really need more evidence in terms of randomized control trials that show that this - that music therapy really is effective. We all know it is extremely effective with children with autism, but there are a lot of skeptical minds out there, like the caller was herself initially. Fortunately, we do have one Cochrane review out already, but it only included a few trials.
Autism is an area of interest for me. I'm on the board of Focus Center for Autism.
You can hear the entire conversation on Science Friday. That's what I did to find out more.
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