Country musician Kenny Rogers probably doesn’t know that his songs are the subject of radical new research into helping stroke victims.

Suffering a stroke, and recovering from one, is one of the most traumatic things that anyone can experience. Imagine your life up to the point of illness as being a completed jigsaw and then something comes along, kicks all the pieces onto the floor and you have to try to put them back together again.

The human brain is still one of the least understood areas of medical science, so where does Kenny Rogers come into it?

Twenty years ago Mike suffered a stroke. He is a keen country and western fan. The stroke caused problems with the left hand side of Mike’s body and his field of vision. When scientists played his favourite pieces to him he could see more. He was even able to spot things which he could not see before.

It is generally agreed that people like Mike suffer “visual neglect” after a stroke. That neglect occurs when the right parietal lobe of the brain is affected, which in turn affects space and navigation.

In very extreme cases people will not eat food on the left hand side of their mouth, or, if asked to draw a clock, will only draw the numbers from 12 to 6, ignoring the left hand side of the clock’s face.

Under research conditions at Birmingham University this changed when they were played their favourite music. Patients actually became aware of things on their “bad side” when they were listening to their favourite music. Those tested had all suffered strokes more than three years previously and it is argued that if the therapy had been used earlier results could have been even better.

Strokes are caused in two ways. A blockage in an artery of the brain is called an ischaemic stroke. Less common is a ruptured artery which causes a haemorrhage known as a primary inter-cranial. This was what Mike had had and when he was played his favourite Kenny Rogers tracks he saw more of the images on the screen in front of him. Now he plays his music much more than he used to.

The Stroke Association welcomes the research and is looking forward to its further use in rehabilitation.

For more information visit www.stroke.org.uk.

Graham Smith for Third Age.