Clinical issues: music therapy in an adult cancer inpatient treatment setting

The adult oncology inpatient music therapy program at Peter MacCallum Cancer Center, which is Australia's only hospital solely dedicated to cancer treatment, research and care, is described. Patients' treatment requirements and often changing conditions compel music therapist to be flexible in their approach, offering both pre-planned treatment sessions and spontaneous sessions in open ward contexts. Patients and families who wish to engage im music therapy choose from various music therapy methods, including live song choice, music imagery and relaxation, therapeutic music lessons, and improvisation. Complex variables inevitable in such human relationship therapies necessitate that, alongside randomized controlled trials, research methods are grounded in the social sciences to meaningfully substantiate, and further advance, oncologic music therapy.