A screening questionnaire for voice problems after treatment of early glottic cancer

Purpose: After treatment for early glottic cancer, a considerable number of patients end up with voice problems interfering with daily life activities. A 5-item screening questionnaire was designed for detection of voice impairment. The purpose of this study is to assess psychometric properties of this questionnaire in clinical practice. Methods and Materials: The questionnaire was completed by 110 controls without voice complaints and 177 patients after radiotherapy or laser surgery for early glottic cancer. Results: Based on normative data of the controls, a score of 5 or less on at least 1 of the 5 questions was considered to state overall voice impairment. Reliability of the questionnaire proved to be good. Voice impairment was reported in 44% of the patients treated with radiotherapy vs. 29% of the patients treated with endoscopic laser surgery. Conclusions: The questionnaire proved to be a reliable, valid, and feasible method to detect voice impairment in daily life. The questionnaire is easy to fill in, and interpretation is straightforward. It is useful for both radiation oncologists and otorhinolaryngologists in their follow-up of patients treated for early glottic cancer

Acoustical analysis of tracheoesophageal voice

Acoustical voice analysis of laryngectomees is a complicated matter because of the often weak periodicity of the voice and the high noise component. This study consists of a feasibility study and validation of an acoustical tracheoesophageal (TE) voice analysis on a sustained vowel based upon recordings of 66 laryngectomees from four clinics in three European countries. Based on reliability analysis of the acoustical data, TE voices can be objectively divided in three categories: (I) good voices with low-frequency harmonics and noise taking over at the higher frequencies; (II) moderate voices consisting of repetitive bursts of sound energy with low repetition rate and a weak periodicity due to high levels of noise, even at the low frequencies; (III) poor voices with no detectable or very weak fundamental frequency or envelope periodicity. The voice samples from category I and II correlate well with perceptually analyzed voice quality parameters, which supports the robustness and validation of this acoustical analysis method to analyze TE voices