The Effect of Music Listening on Pain, Heart Rate Variability, and Range of Motion in Older Adults After Total Knee Replacement

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects that listening and not listening to music had on pain relief, heart rate variability (HRV), and knee range of motion in total knee replacement (TKR) patients who underwent continuous passive motion (CPM) rehabilitation. We adopted a single-group quasi-experimental design. A sample of 49 TKR patients listened to music for 25 min during one session of CPM and no music during another session of CPM the same day for a total of 2 days. Results indicated that during CPM, patients exhibited a significant decrease in the pain level (p <.05), an increase in the CPM knee flexion angle (p <.05), a decrease in the low-frequency/high-frequency ratio (LF/HF) and normalized LF (nLF) of the HRV (p <.01), and an increase in the normalized HF (nHF) and standard deviation of all normal-to-normal intervals (SDNN; p <.01) when listening to music compared with no music. This study demonstrated that listening to music can effectively decrease pain during CPM rehabilitation and improve the joint range of motion in patients who underwent TKR surgery.