SAN ANTONIO – After watching the documentary “Alive Inside,” Victoria Reyna, then president of the Sigma Alpha Iota music fraternity at UTSA, said her members were inspired.
“Of course, we were all in tears and just decided we have to do something about this and bring it to our community,” Reyna said.
She said they spent weeks raising the needed funds to buy iPods, like those in the film, so that Alzheimer’s and dementia patients could feel the power that music has on memory.
Morningside Ministries memory care facility at Menger Springs was the first in the San Antonio area to accept the new iPods.
Suzanne Huber, its executive director, said often those patients are bored and anxious, but rather than use medication if needed, music has a calming effect.
“It brings them back into that time of their life,” Huber said. “They can remember the music. It’s so ingrained in their brains and I think they’re able to remember more. I think their recall is better. They’re happier.”
Harold Underwood, whose 90-year-old mother Nellie Bea Boone suffers from Alzheimer's, said he was more hopeful than skeptical when he was told of the program.
“Before, she was kind of withdrawn, slept a lot and had little interaction with me,” Underwood said.
For the first time since her illness, Underwood said he feels his mother’s touch again as now she holds his hand.
“I think she recognizes me. She may not know who I am, but she knows I’m somebody who cares for her,” Underwood said.
He said his mother, a former bank vice president in East Texas, always enjoyed music, dancing and singing in the church choir.
Underwood said the playlist he provided included music from the big band era, as well as country and gospel.
But one of her all-time favorites is the legendary crooner Frank Sinatra, who she was listening to, sing his rendition of “Chicago” on her headphones.
“She went to see Frank Sinatra as a teenager and he was singing with (bandleader) Tommy Dorsey,” Underwood said.
He said he’s pleased to see his mother being more responsive, even reading her magazines.
Underwood said the music therapy has exceeded his expectations.
“I don’t know if it will work for everyone, but it’s bound to work for someone," he said.
Watch an excerpt from the "Alive Inside" documentary below.