The Efficiency of Voice Therapy for the Patients with Mutational Falsetto

변성발성장애 환자에 대한 음성치료의 효과

Mutational falsetto is a kind of voice disorders due to the failure to acquire proper low-pitched voice during the puberty. The patients with mutational falsetto can produce the normal low-pitched voice by the surgical treatment, like the type III-thyroplasty, or the voice therapy. The present study is, focusing on the latter treatment, to consider the efficiency of voice therapy for the mutational falsetto. The 7 patients who were diagnosed as mutational falsetto by the laryngologists, and treated by the voice therapist were selected as subjects. Their voices of pretherapy and posttherapy were analyzed on the aspects of acoustics and aerodynamics. Acoustic analysis was done by the MDVP(Multidimensional Voice Program) of CSL(Computerized Speech Lab, Kay Elemetrics, Co.), and aerodynamic analysis, by the Maximum Sustained Phonation of Aerophone II(Kay Elemetrics, Co.). By these measurements, we could find that fundamental frequency(F0) was significantly lowered, on the average, 65Hz. Maximum phonation time(MPT) was increased 4.57 second, and shimmer was decreased 1.644%, respectively, and each changes was statistically significant, too. On the average, jitter was decreased 0.499%, mean flow rate(MFR) was decreased 27.71ml/sec, and NHR was increased 0.023 which was the only parameter not showing improvement. But the changes of jitter, MFR and NHR were not statistically significant.