Effect of group empowerment drumming on cognition, mood states, and impact among women with fibromyalgia

Introduction: Fibromyalgia (FM) is characterized by chronic, widespread pain usually accompanied with mood and cognitive dysfunction. This study sought to answer: Would group empowerment drumming (GED) increase cognitive performance in women with FM? Additionally, it was hypothesized that women in the GED group would improve their mood states and would report decreased symptom severity (SS) compared to the educational (EDU) group. Methods: Twelve women with FM were age- and education-matched and randomly assigned to the GED or EDU group after completing a battery of baseline measures consisting of cognitive performance measures, the Profile of Mood States-Brief (POMS), the Pain Catastrophizing Scale (PCS), and the Fibromyalgia Impact Questionnaire-Revised (FIQR). Participants completed post-assessments after attending 1-1.5 hour EDU or GED sessions once/week for 6 weeks. A mixed-methods approach employed the use of audio recordings for structured GED sessions. Results: Post-test analyses showed that SS differed significantly between the EDU group (n=5; Mdn=33.50) compared to the GED group (n=4; Mdn =19.00), U = .000, z = -2.449, p < .008, r = -.82. Furthermore, total FIQR scores differed significant between the EDU group (Mdn =61.00) compared to the GED group (Mdn =33.75), U = .000, z = -2.449, p < .008, r = -.82. Cognitive performance measures, POMS, and PCS did not yield significant results; however, trends indicated an improvement in both groups after 6 weeks. Qualitative findings corroborated preliminary analyses and provided further insight into the impact GED had on participants. Conclusion: This data suggests that GED offered in a community setting may be effective in managing symptoms, but not cognitive dysfunction, associated with FM.