5. Lullaby (video) (4:33)
Caitlin Collins, Ben Kaplan-Singer & Heiko Yang
Presented at the International Academy for Communications in Healthcare meeting,
Miami, FL October 2009

We wrote this musical piece, entitled “Lullaby,” to convey a sense of the physical hardships and emotional burden that patients with chronic conditions must endure. The song tracks the story of a young girl’s illness (chronic migraines) through the years. For the first three verses, her story is narrated from the perspective of her doctors in the format of a dictation. The last verse is a real excerpt from one of her journal entries.

The presentation may be viewed on youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lbj129Cxwes.

The choruses are reiterations of a lullaby. We chose a lullaby to symbolize despair and hope in the face of illness. Despair is the desire to sleep and escape from reality; hope is the resilient belief in a brighter tomorrow.