Mindy Ren

Background

About Mindy Ren

I am a newly qualified, HCPC-registered music therapist with a First-Class Honours MA from Anglia Ruskin University. My clinical experience spans NHS mental health services and special educational needs settings. I delivered music therapy for adults facing complex mental health challenges—including PTSD, psychosis, bipolar, and suicidal ideation—and collaborated closely with multidisciplinary teams including doctors, clinical psychologists, occupational therapists and nurses. In special needs settings, I worked with children and young people with autism, profound and multiple learning disabilities (PMLD), global developmental delay, and other complex needs. I collaborated with learning support staff, teachers, speech and language therapists, and physiotherapists to ensure integrated, child-centred care. My approach draws from psychodynamic, trauma-informed, and music-centred frameworks, using improvisation, songwriting, and shared music-making to foster emotional expression, resilience, and connection. Informed by both research and lived experience, my practice is rooted in empathy, flexibility, and evidence-based thinking. I recently completed Neurologic Music Therapy training to deepen my work in neurorehabilitation and cognitive support. I’m interested in interdisciplinary and community-based practice, reflected in my MA research on collaboration between music therapists and community musicians. A committed lifelong learner, I bring creativity, critical reflection, and cultural sensitivity to every session—whether through songwriting, improvisation, or shared listening. I aim to make music therapy more accessible across diverse settings, including preventative health, CAMHS, forensics, and end-of-life care.