Music – Corpus

Takotsubo cardiomyopathy – and a little art with our medicine

28 November 2016 1 Comment

Dr Cindy Towns

Takotsubo cardiomyopathy is thought to account for 1-2 percent of acute coronary syndromes (ACS), ACS being medicalese for what most people would call ‘heart attacks’.

Takotsubo as a diagnosis got its name from a Japanese Octopus pot which looks a little like the Takotsubo heart on echocardiography (essentially an ultrasound). Takotsubo has some more creative synonyms, including acute stress cardiomyopathy, broken heart syndrome and ‘scared to death’. It mimics a traditional heart attack but is not due to coronary artery disease. Rather, the structure of the heart balloons in places. Classically, physically or emotionally distressing events precede the presentation, but the exact mechanism of the condition remains speculative. It has been associated with earthquakes in both Japan and New Zealand.

There’s a crack in everything – that’s how the light gets in

21 November 2016 1 Comment

Max Reid

This post was originally written late on Friday 11^th November 2016, after a week of struggling to come to terms with the American election result, only to hear that afternoon of the death of poet/songwriter/musician Leonard Cohen. Adjusting to that news with a glass of wine at the ready, and Leonard’s London Concert double album playing loud enough to send the cat and dog scampering for cover, the post originally began, “Just when you thought events in the world couldn’t get any worse … we hear news that Leonard Cohen has died…”

“Anthem” Leonard Cohen, Auckland 21 December 2013 (his last concert)

Well, events in the world invariably can and do get worse, and sometimes a wee bit close to home. Within little more than 48 hours North Canterbury and Wellington had been rocked by a series of devastating earthquakes.

So this post, which was originally drafted as something of a tribute to Leonard Cohen, now serves as much as a tribute to people of Kaikoura and the surrounding areas – as they wrestle to find meaning and hope in the midst of what for them is, in so many ways, a broken world.

Leonard Cohen (1934-2016)

13 November 2016 1 Comment

The Gospel of Singing

3 October 2016 1 Comment

Chris Nichol

Gospel singers Last week we went to church, Ebenezer Missionary Baptist Church in New Orleans, to be precise. While we were there we witnessed, and took part in, some transformative singing. The experience was something like this.

More learned people than me would find ways to explain the power of this kind of participative performance in psychological or chemical terms. They’d probably be right. But they’d also have missed the point. The point has to do with exhilaration, an elation that transported some people and will serve to sustain others through the coming week.

My mother-in-law has a radio in her head

15 August 2016 Leave a Comment

Chris Nichol

My mother-in-law has a radio in her head. She enjoys audio hallucinations. Well, “enjoy” may not be the word. Sometimes, I think, she enjoys them. At other times she endures them. The real problem is she can’t turn them off. For the best part of a year now she’s been concerned that muzak is regularly playing in her apartment. She’s asked us to have a word with the management to get it turned off. Unfortunately we can’t hear it at all. It’s not playing for us.

“That’s my stroke”: Expressive Arts Therapy with a survivor of stroke

11 July 2016 Leave a Comment

Rose Stanton

Arts Therapy is a form of psychotherapy which connects with a variety of theoretical frameworks. It is more focused on the creative process and self-understanding than on art as an end product. I practise the multimodal approach. This is the use of two or more expressive therapies to foster awareness, encourage emotional growth, and enhance relationships with others. The expressive arts therapies can be defined as “the use of art, music, dance/movement, drama, poetry/creative writing, play, and sandtray within the context of psychotherapy, counselling, rehabilitation or health care” Malchiodi (2005, p. 2).