Schizophrenics are less likely to hear imaginary voices if they hum softly, a study found.
"Currently, humming is seldom if ever used in treatment of schizophrenic patients," but it may prove useful for those who aren't helped by antipsychotic drugs, the federal Alcohol, Drug Abuse and Mental Health Administration said in reporting on the study in its May newsletter.Schizophrenia is a baffling and debilitating mental illness characterized by increasingly bizarre symptoms that usually start appearing during adolescence or young adulthood. An estimated 4 million Americans are at risk of developing the disease, according to the American Psychiatric Association.
Schizophrenics partly lose touch with reality. They often withdraw socially, can't concentrate, have trouble sleeping, talk nonsense, and suffer delusions and visual and auditory hallucinations. During auditory hallucinations, schizophrenics hear voices that command them to take various actions.
Psychiatrists don't know how such hallucinations occur. But evidence indicates that patients who hear voices are activating their speech muscles without producing audible sounds. That somehow triggers the hallucinations, according to the theory.
The doctors who conducted the study theorized that humming would interfere with this inaudible muscle activity and prevent the patients from hearing voices.
The study involved 20 schizophrenic men and women who researchers had quietly hum a single note. That produced a 59 percent reduction in auditory hallucinations, the newsletter said.
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(Additional Story)
Clozaril may halt breathing
The new anti-schizophrenia drug Clozaril may halt breathing after the first dose, especially in patients taking tranquilizers, a consumer group says.
Public Citizen Health Research Group said it wants the Food and Drug Administration to require a warning about the risk of breathing stoppage on the label of clozapine, sold as Clozaril by Sandoz Pharmaceuticals Corp. of East Hanover, N.J.
"A simple, direct, explicit warning could save a life," said Dr. Ida Hellander of Public Citizen, which was founded by consumer activist Ralph Nader.
William O'Donnell, a spokesman for Sandoz, said the company and the FDA have known about the risk of breathing stoppage "for some time," and plans to send a letter to doctors alerting them of the potential problem.
Clozaril, the first new drug for the treatment of schizophrenia in 30 years, has been the subject of controversy since it was approved last year.