The importance of music for a successful training

At Akina, we do everything we can to make your physiotherapy training at home as enjoyable, effective and entertaining as possible, so you can get on the road to recovery as quickly as possible.

Our aim is to offer you a customized training experience that is precisely tailored to your individual needs. We achieve this not only through a therapy plan personalized to you, but also through individual AI-supported feedback that you receive in real time while training with Akina.

Another crucial aspect of personalized therapeutic training is the right music. Used correctly, music can inspire and motivate us or help us relax and regenerate. However, as preferences and tastes vary, the same song can be the perfect complement to someone's workout, while someone else may find it distracting. That's why we want you to be able to choose the music genre that suits you best for your workout.

In this article, we summarize how music can affect our well-being and athletic performance, the importance of music for Akina and how we have integrated the right music genres into our software thanks to the collaboration with Feed.fm.

Effects of music on body and mind

Music is everywhere in our daily lives: it accompanies us on our way to work, while shopping, on TV, while cooking, in the bar, during sports... It's not just everyday activities that are underscored by music - can you imagine a special event without the perfect soundtrack?

Whether you listen to it consciously or it is a quiet buzz in the background - music is omnipresent in our society. And for good reason. The power of music affects our physical and emotional well-being, boosts our performance and can have a positive impact on our health.

Various studies have investigated the connection between music and cardiovascular responses. The result: certain types of music can significantly reduce the heart rate and blood pressure. 

While the heart as an organ literally reacts to music, the heart can also be affected by it in a figurative sense. Depending on the type of music, the body releases hormones that can intensify our feelings and moods. 

Even non-musical sounds can trigger strong emotions or physical sensations. Think of the squeaking of fingernails on a blackboard. The mere thought of it can lead to goose bumps and physical discomfort.

Apart from the aforementioned effect on heart rate, breathing and body tension can also be influenced by music. Music can also have a stress-reducing effect. One study showed that people who listened to relaxing music during a standardized stress test had significantly lower blood cortisol levels than those who did not. 

Unmusical noise also has an impact on health - it can lead to headaches, increased irritability and high blood pressure.

Music in sport: what you need to know about it

Music is also extremely effective in sports: rhythm and tempo have a noticeable influence on endurance, running speed and recovery after training. It is particularly worth playing a suitable playlist during running training, where tempo and rhythm play an important role. Ideally, it should not just be a random compilation of your favorite songs, but should be adapted to your personal level of exertion and performance. According to a study by sports psychologist Professor Costas Karageorghis, the rhythm of the music should be in the range of your running heart rate, i.e. between 110 and 130 bpm (beats per minute). 

Not only the physical but also the psychological effects of music during sport are undisputed. Athletes who listen to music during training have been shown to experience positive psychological effects: They enjoy the sporting activity far more and perceive the training session as more enjoyable and less stressful.

All these reasons have inspired us at Akina to enhance our therapeutic training plans with different musical genres and sounds.

Implementing the right music at Akina

We're used to listening to music during all kinds of activities, and these experiences are enhanced by a great soundtrack. Surprisingly, however, they are missing in many medical and health applications. For our software, it was important to us to provide our users with different genres. You can choose between Alt Beats, Pop, Acoustic, Piano and Strings, Ambient Music and Nature Sounds. However, those who prefer to do their therapeutic training in silence can choose no music.

The implementation of music in the software was largely made possible by Feed.fm. Thanks to their extensive knowledge of genres, music licensing, technology and music strategy, the experts at Feed.fm created the musical experience we were looking for in our software. 

Music licensing is a complex and time-consuming process, which Feed.fm took care of for us during the development and launch of our product. This enabled us to get the right music to our users as quickly as possible. 

Not only did they cover all the genres we wanted for the software, they also went the extra mile when it came to nature sounds. As a US company based in California, nature sounds means, among other things, the sound of ocean waves. But we also wanted to offer Akina users in Switzerland authentic, local sounds such as the babbling of a mountain stream, the chirping of birds and the sound of gentle rainfall. The Feed.fm team has made it its mission to capture these sounds and make them available to us.

The different music genres, the authentic nature sounds and the ability to customize the digital coach's voice and coaching styles provide you with the perfect foundation to make your therapeutic training with Akina as individualized and personal as possible. That way, you'll be on the road to recovery as quickly as possible.

Are you ready to try Akina for yourself?