Effectos of music therapy during pregnancy and labor

OBJECTIVE: to analyze and describe the best evidence available about the effects of music therapy during pregnancy and labor. METHOD: an integrative review where a bibliographic search was conducted in the main search engines and biomedical databases, such as PubMed, Cuiden, Cinhal, Scielo, Ime, Enfispo, Ebsco Host, Lilacs, Dialnet, Latindex, Cochrane Library and Portal Evidencia, from January, 2004 to July, 2014. The terms included in this search were: 'pregnancy', 'delivery', 'obstetric labor', 'childbirth', 'newborn' and 'music therapy'. Said key words were combined with the logical operators 'AND' and 'OR'. Article selection was conducted by reading the title and subsequently reading the abstract in English, which referred to the objective of the review. The complete text of the articles selected was reviewed, and they were assessed through the CASPE Critical Appraisal Tools. RESULTS: out of all reviews found in databases, 18 were selected by their title; and out of these, only six were found to refer to the objective in their complete text. Finally, there was a selection of those which met the majority of the assessment criteria, and therefore showed a medium-high to medium-low quality, and finally the review of four studies was conducted. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS: several effects were evident while listening to music, such as pain relief during contractions, a lower level of stress, as well as a reduction in anxiety and fear. Music therapy caused feelings of safety, tranquillity, relaxation and calm in women. Newborns who were exposed to music showed positive reactions when they recognized those songs they had listened to previously