Dance Therapy - Criticisms

Criticisms

Despite literature on Dance Therapy dating back to the 1940s, there remains no scientific evidence for the therapeutic efficacy of DMT.

A review by The Cochrane Collaboration on Dance/movement therapy for improving psychological and physical outcomes in cancer patients stated "We did not find support for an effect of dance/movement therapy on body image. The findings of one study suggest that dance/movement therapy may have a beneficial effect on QoL. However, the limited number of studies prevents us from drawing conclusions concerning the effects of dance/movement therapy on psychological and physical outcomes in cancer patients." Similarly, a review of Dance therapy for schizophrenia indicated "This therapy remains unproven" and "There is no evidence to support - or refute - the use of dance therapy in this group of people."

The fact remains that over the history of DMT, there have been very few well conducted randomized controlled trials to investigate its efficacy across a range of psychological and physical disorders. As these are medical claims, they are therefore entirely testable; and therefore it should be considered disingenuous and fraudulent to make claims about medical efficacy when no evidence exists to lend credence to such claims. Although dancers themselves perhaps feel a sense of joy or freedom during their personal practice, this should not be extrapolated to conditions as complex as chronic depression or schizophrenia, which should be treated as medical conditions. There is evidence that physical activity generally is beneficial for patients suffering from mild depression, however there is not yet sufficient evidence that DMT specifically adds any significant additional benefit to this baseline.