• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.117-121
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• 2010

The This study aimed to evaluate the effects of the voice therapy we operated to the patients with age-related dysphonia. Thirty four participants who were diagnosed as age-related dysphonia in laryngoscopic finding from January, 2009 to December, 2009 completed the study. The participants were aged from 60 to 82 years old with a mean age of 70.6. All participants had received the abdominal breath technique, SKHPIP with laughter, and basic vocal training with description of their problem, the length of which ranged from four sessions to twelve sessions. We executed the videostroboscopy to compare the aspect of voicing change and the perceptual assessment, voice range profile, acoustic and aerodynamic measures to identify change of voice. Participants had glottal gap due to incomplete glottic closure during voicing on the pretest. After they took the voice therapy, the glottic gap became narrow and rough and breathy voice was reduced. There were significant difference in acoustic and aerodynamic measures. Jitter, Shimmer, MFR were reduced and MPT, Psub were increased(p<.05). Participants' pitch range and intensity range were increased on the posttest performance after taking voice therapy. Especially, most of them were showed that pitch range was increased significantly in high frequency area. The results of this investigation indicate that the voice therapy using abdominal breath, SKHPIP, and exercise together is effective for the patients who have age-related dysphonia to improve their voice quality. We recommend to apply this technique to functional voice disorders who are showed glottal gap.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Laryngology, Phoniatrics and Logopedics
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.27-31
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• 1996

The voice of aged persons is known generally to be somewhat different from that of other adults, suggesting that laryngeal change occurs with advancing age. However, because knowledge of the voice characteristics of aged persons is limited, it is difficult to judge whether their voices arc normal. Chart review and laryngoscopic examination from ninety-one patients with hoarseness over the age of 60(1st group) and one hundred sixteen patients with hoarseness below the age of 50(2nd group) were done to define aging related voice disorders. The following results were obtained. 1) Associated diseases related to laryngeal disease were hypertension(12%), pulmonary disease(4.4%), thyroid disease(1.1%) in 1st group and hypertension(9.5%), thyroid disease(1.7%) in 2nd group. 2) The underlying diseases causing hoarseness in order of frequency were benign vocal fold lesion(37.7%), inflammatory disease(36.8%), functional dysphonia(17%) in 1st group and benign vocal fold lesion(43.6%), functional dysphonia(26.3%), inflammatory disease(16.5%) in 2nd group. 3) In stroboscopic findings, atrophy and sulcus of vocal cords are more prevalent in males than in females and edema of vocal cords is more common in females. Generally the voice characteristics of aged persons depend on the mass of the vocal folds which may be decreased through atrophy or be increased by edema. However, other factors such as systemic diseases, drug side effects and compensatory mechanism to presbylaryngis must be taken into account in diagnosing and treating voice disorders in aged persons.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.93-98
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• 2009

The aim of this study was to investigate voice characteristics of adductive spasmodic dysphonia(ADSD) by measuring electroglottal and acoustic examination at the sentence level. The clinical records of 86 ADSD female patients (age group of $20{\sim}50$ years) and the control records of 86 normal females (age group of $20{\sim}40$ years) were recorded by speech studio(Laryngograph Ltd., UK). An independent t-test was used to compare ADSD and normal group. Results were as follows. (1) Fundamental frequency($F_0$) was significantly decreased in ADSD compared with normal group. (2) Irregularity of frequency and closed quotient(CQ) was significantly increased in ADSD compared with normal group. (3) Voiceless duration increased and voiced duration was significantly decreased in ADSD compared with normal group. (4) Fricative duration was increased in ADSD compared with normal group but it wasn't significant. In conclusion, strained, tight and choked voice shows an increase of CQ, tremor voice shows an increase of irregularity of frequency and less feminine voice shows decrease of $F_0$. Increase of voiceless duration and fricative duration and decrease of voiced duration related with diminution speech intelligibility.