Creating a COVID-19 Guided Imagery and Music (GIM) self-help resource for those with mild to moderate symptoms of the disease

Abstract

This report discusses the creation of a COVID-19 Guided Imagery and Music (GIM) self-help resource available on YouTube in nine different languages. GIM, which is a specialist area of practice in music therapy, is best understood as a spectrum of methods. The COVID self-help resource is an example of ‘directed music imaging’, which is an outcome-specific GIM method where a talk-over or imagery script is spoken aloud whilst the music is playing. The resource is intended both to support the body’s own healing process in patients with mild to moderate disease and to provide psychological and emotional support. The suitability of the music used, Pärt’s Spiegel im Spiegel, is discussed, as is the talk-over and its relationship with the music. Special concerns that needed to be addressed in creating a generic online GIM resource for COVID patients are also discussed.