Listening to Mozart may help reduce the frequency of epileptic seizures, an updated meta-analysis confirms.

The “highly consistent” results suggest that music-based neuromodulation deserves consideration as a “complementary, non-invasive approach for treating epilepsy and epileptiform discharges”, the authors say.

The research was presented during the virtual European College of Neuropsychopharmacology meeting on 12 September and published in Clinical Neurophysiology.

Evidence to support the “Mozart effect” in epilepsy has been accumulating since the late 1990s when the therapeutic effects of listening to Mozart’s music on epilepsy were first reported. However, it remains controversial.