Comparison of Subjective Assessment of Voice Disorders and Objective Voice Measurement

Background: Apart from perceptual and acoustic parameters of a voice disorder, the patient's individual concerns are important because dysphonia can lead to relevant mental and physical stress. The purpose of our study was to analyze the relationship between patients' self-assessed concerns over different voice disorders and objective acoustic parameters of their voice. Methods: The Voice Handicap Index 12 (VHI-12) and the Gottingen Hoarseness Diagram (GHD) were evaluated in 226 patients with voice disorders. Individual VHI-12 items were correlated with the parameters of acoustic sound analysis. Result: The frequencies of items classified as negative voice experiences ranked one to three. Patients with unilateral vocal fold paralysis were most affected by their voice disorder. Partially significant Pearson's correlations were found between the VHI-12 items and the acoustic parameters from the GHD. Discussion: The results of our studies show that voice disorders are very impairing to the affected patients and that vocalizing was rated as particularly strenuous. However, self-assessment and sound analysis provide different information about voice function. Both findings have an important role in comprehensive voice diagnostics. Copyright (C) 2010 S. Karger AG, Basel