A review on musicians' health education programs

What is it about?

A scoping review looked at research on implementation of musicians’ health education programs focusing on hearing, musculoskeletal, psychological, and vocal health, as well as injury prevention. The review included both published and unpublished studies on occupational health education programs for music students and teachers at pre-tertiary and tertiary levels.

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Why is it important?

The review systematically synthesizes a large body of evidence: Charted 46 studies (35 tertiary, 7 pre-tertiary, 2 teacher-focused, 2 systematic reviews) on musicians' health education, reporting on the benefits: Identified that musicians' health education and injury prevention strategies reduce self-reported playing-related pain and music performance anxiety in both pre-tertiary and tertiary students. The review identified gaps and challenges, including behavior change sustainability and barriers to long-term adoption of health strategies, plus the need for more pre-tertiary implementations and teacher training. Results emphasize the importance of systemic embedding of health promotion and occupational health training across all music education settings to address the high prevalence of performance-related health problems among musicians.