Association Between Voice Handicap Index and Praat Voice Analysis in Patients with Benign Vocal Cord Lesion Before and After Microscopic Laryngeal Surgery

Abstract

Benign vocal cord lesion is a benign mass formed in vocal cord in form of vocul nodule, vocal cord polyp, vocal cord cyst and vocal cord granuloma. Voice handicap index (VHI) is one of subjective voice analyses. This study aimed to analyse correlation between VHI score and praat voice analysis in benign vocal cord lesion before and after microscopic laryngeal surgery. This study was carried out from November 2009 to December 2010 at Outpatient Unit of Otorhinolaryngology, Head and Neck Surgery and Integrated Oncology Center of Dr. Soetomo General Hospital, Surabaya, Indonesia. Pearson's correlation test found a negative correlation between total VHI score with base frequency and harmonic-to-noise ratio (HNR) (r = - 0.186, p = 0.689; r = - 0.650, p = 0.114). On the other hand, there was a positive correlation between total VHI score with jitter and shimmer (r = 0.812, p = 0.027; r = 0.638, p = 0.123). It could be inferred that base frequency, shimmer and HNR after surgery had no significant correlation (p > 0.05), while VHI total score significantly correlated with jitter after surgery (p < 0.05). We found no correlation between VHI score and Praat voice analysis in patients with benign vocal cord lesion before and after surgery, except correlation between VHI functional subscale with HNR and VHI total score with jitter.

Keywords: Benign vocal cord lesion; Harmonic-to-noise ratio; Praat voice analysis; Voice Handicap Index.