The emotional tunes and the role of mirror neurons: From primary relationship mother-child relation to rehabilitation and therapeutic music therapy

This article mainly intended as a tribute to one of the fathers of Infant Research, Daniel Stern, who with his studies on the development of the sense of self in children, has expanded the field of observation of the mother-child relationship, from a simple vision drives a real relationship, characterized by sensory elements global.His research has been forming the basis of the theoretical and methodological focus of music therapy to psychodynamic. The ability to reproduce the relational process characterized by affective attunements in a rehabilitation setting - music therapy where there are dis-evolution, as in the case of patients with Alzheimer's disease, you can reactivate capacity affective and relational residual strengthening in the subject 'personal and social identity mortified by the disease. Role within that path is done by a very peculiar type of neurons, mirror neurons, the subject of study in recent years by the neurosciences, whose characteristic would be to get excited is when a person performs a certain action, both when it is another to do it before his eyes

Effect of COVID-19 quarantine on cognitive, functional and neuropsychiatric symptoms in patients with mild cognitive impairment and dementia

Background During the last two years, COVID-19 affected older people with dementia or mild cognitive impairment (MCI), but conflicting and sparse results are still present. The objective of this study was to investigate the frequency and type of changes in functional, cognitive and behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD), and caregiver's stress during the period of quarantine in 2020 in patients affected by dementia/MCI living in Palermo, Sicily. Methods Outpatients affected by MCI/dementia were evaluated before and after COVID-19 quarantine. Functional status was investigated using basic and instrumental activities of daily living (ADL); cognitive performance with the mini-mental state examination; BPSD through the neuropsychiatric inventory (NPI). All scales were reported as pre/post-COVID-19 quarantine and a logistic regression analysis was performed for investigating the factors associated with worsening in NPI in patients and their caregivers. Results One hundred patients (mean age 77.1; females = 59%) were evaluated over a median of 10 months. In the sample as whole, a significant decline in functional and cognitive status was observed (p < 0.001 for both comparisons). The NPI significantly increased by 3.56 +/- 8.96 points after the COVID-19 quarantine (p < 0.0001), while the caregivers' stress increased by 1.39 +/- 3.46 points between the two evaluations (p < 0.0001). The decline was more evident in people with milder dementia. Higher values of instrumental ADL at baseline were associated with a significant lower worsening in NPI and caregiver's stress. Conclusions COVID-19 quarantine negatively affected functional, cognitive, and neuropsychiatric symptoms in older people affected by dementia/MCI, highlighting the impact of COVID-19 quarantine for this population