St. Mary's Hospital is adding music therapy

Music therapy, an established health service, similar to occupational therapy and physical therapy, is set to become a regular component of St. Mary's Hospital/Healthcare System for Children.
Announcing the complementary care initiative, Dr. Burton Grebin, president and CEO of St. Mary's Healthcare System for Children, and Len Leeds, founder and senior partner of the law firm of Leeds Morelli & Brown, touted the success of St. Mary's music therapy program at its Bayside hospital on Tuesday, November 21.
&#8220The compassionate care and intensive rehabilitation that our highly-skilled staff provides . . . improves lives, but our complementary care - including music, art and poetry - truly enhances our patients' experiences at St. Mary's and helps them heal better and faster,” Dr. Grebin explained.
In addition to 97 in-patient beds in Bayside and a further 45-50 in Westchester County, St. Mary's serves the needs of over 3,000 children in a nine county area each day.
The program, which uses musical activities to address patient needs related to respiration, chronic pain, physical rehabilitation, diabetes, cardiac conditions and surgery, has been shown to reduce pain and stress, enhance the immune system, improve the emotional state of patients and even decrease length of hospital stay.
A special holiday season benefit concert is scheduled at Tilles Center for the Performing Arts, 720 Northern Boulevard, Greenvale, NY on Saturday, December 2, to raise funds to support and expand the music and art therapy programs. Rock and roll legend Neil Sedaka and special guest Len Leeds will perform.
&#8220We are proud to donate the proceeds from this special concert so that we can help St. Mary's,” Mr. Leeds said.
Tickets are $85, $75 and $65 and can be purchased from Tilles Center Box Office at 516-299-3100 or at www.tillescenter.org. A limited number of VIP tickets, including a special &#8220Meet and Greet” with Mr. Sedaka, are also available by calling 718-281-8890. This concert is produced by Entertainment Unlimited by Ted Fass.