A native of Holland is celebrating the successful launch of a twelve-week occupational therapy program that uses music-driven, therapeutic movements to help those with Parkinson’s.
James Lenger and his clinical director, Casey Hayes, represent Theraplaying — a “groundbreaking technology” that eliminates the mundane by using a guitar as the centerpiece for treating certain disorders.
Lenger is the founder of Sharp and Flat, a musical innovation hub that creates products to empower people both with and without disabilities to create and enjoy music more easily. Under that umbrella, he’s obtained patents and launched a product called Strum Perfect, an attachment that helps guitar-hopefuls strum correctly and learn up to six times faster.
Lenger is a graduate of Holland Christian and a former student of Hope College.
“The big thing this last year has been putting in the work with the research,” Lenger said. “We have two research papers in peer-reviewed journals and that helped lay the foundation for what we can do.”
There’s no musical experience or ability required to use the program, according to Lenger, which has been shown to reduce tremors and rigidity, improve balance and coordination, and enhance emotional well-being.
“A lot of times what happens is people become unmotivated to participate in therapy and life, and then the progression (of the disease) happens faster,” Hayes said. “We’re slowing down the progression … with adherence to the therapy.
“We’re trying to give people a reason to keep moving and to keep participating in something.”
Theraplaying uses Strum Perfect to improve wrist motion and a wrist “actigraph” to track progress with real-time health data. Drawing from a therapeutic music library, the program also boosts dopamine in users, according to Lenger.
After a round of fundraising, the team is focused on scaling up. Lenger has connected with Corewell Health and Holland Hospital, where patients can now get a prescription for Theraplaying. The group hopes to make the program available around the world.
Learn more at theraplaying.com.
— Contact reporter Austin Metz at ametz@hollandsentinel.com.
This article originally appeared on The Holland Sentinel: Hollander’s guitar-based therapy provides ‘a reason to keep moving’
Reporting by Austin Metz, Holland Sentinel / The Holland Sentinel
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