Quality of life and voice intelligibility in laryngeal cancer patients -: Relevance of the "Satisfaction paradox"

Background: Aim of this study was to compare postoperative quality of life and voice intelligibility of laryngeal cancer patients. Patients and Methods: Two studies assessed the quality of life (by EORTC QLQ-C30 and EORTC QLQ-H&N35) and the voice intelligibility (by PLIT and FPAL) of 218 laryngectomized and 151 partially resected patients. The data of 86 patients was analysed on the basis of matched pairs (matching criteria: sex and tumour stage). Results: The smelling and tasting of the laryngectornized patients were more affected. Other domains of quality of life did not differ significantly between the groups. The subjective assessment of voice intelligibility led to worse results among the patients with partial laryngectomy, although the objective test proved the contrary. Conclusions: Subjective and objective assessment of quality of life can differ, which led to paradox results in this study, especially for voice intelligibility. This might be due to the fact that partially resected patients have higher expectations of their operation.