Music reduces anxiety and the need for sedatives in preoperative patients. Currently, propofol is usually infused using target controlled infusion device. With the use of such a device, we investigated the effects of music on the effect-site concentration of propofol for loss of consciousness.

Sixty-five ASA 1 or 2 patients aged 35 to 55 years who were scheduled for general anesthesia were randomly allocated to either the control, music or headphone group. The control group patients were exposed to the ambient operating room atmosphere (n = 17), the music group patients listened to music (n = 25), and headphone group wore a headphone alone without listening to music (n = 23). Propofol was infused with a predetermined effect-site concentration and we determined loss of consciousness in patients by a verbal response and eyelash reflex for 3 minutes. Each concentration of propofol was predetermined by the up-and-down method with 0.4µg/ml as the step size.

Loss of consciousness was observed at a concentration of 4.20 ± 0.25µg/ml in the control group, 3.60 ± 0.34µg/ml in the music group, and 3.73 ± 0.47µg/ml in the headphone group. The effect-site concentration for loss of consciousness was significantly lower in the music group as compared to the control group (P < 0.05). The effect-site concentration in the headphone group, however, showed no statistical difference as compared to the control group (P = 0.117).

Listening to music reduced overall propofol effect-site concentration for loss of consciousness that was required by patients.