Each year, the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) awards the prize to international students at German universities who have shown remarkable social or intercultural commitment through their studies. Pilsook Cha from South Korea was awarded this year’s prize at the University of Augsburg.

Cha is studying in the master’s degree programme in music therapy at the University of Augsburg. Her outstanding academic performance is distinguished by her exceptional volunteer work. Cha is involved in a project that aims to minimise the consequences of post-operative delirium (POD), a serious complication marked by a severe loss of consciousness and perceptual awareness, at the Clinic for Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care Medicine at Augsburg University Hospital.

“Pilsook Cha made a significant contribution to the development of a clinical trial that consisted of an intervention that combined haptic and auditory musical experiences on a SoundPad and a conversation,” explains Prof Susanne Metzner, head of research and studies in music therapy at the Leopold Mozart College of Music. Cha played an important role in composing music specially designed for the project. “She began her voluntary work towards the end of the pandemic when intensive care units were under particular strain. Cha visited (and still continues to visit) patients in intensive care with the POD, sensitively adapting to each patient in order to be able to communicate with them. This requires not only a high degree of empathy but also the ability to tolerate a breakdown in communication as when it is delayed or faltering, neither forcing nor giving up on it,” explains Metzner.

Pilsook Cha holds a bachelor’s and a master’s degree specialising in piano. In 2004, she moved to Germany where she worked in Hamburg, Munich, and Berlin before coming to Augsburg to study music therapy.