title: Coordinated electrical pacing of vocal cord abductors in recurrent laryngeal nerve paralysis.
abstract: Electrodes were placed into the posterior cricoarytenoid and diaphragmatic muscles of five tracheostomized dogs. With the use of a sensor that would selectively detect diaphragmatic electromyographic activity, this activity served as a trigger and was amplified and interfaced with a muscle stimulator attached to electrodes placed in the posterior cricoarytenoid muscles. In all animals obvious physiologic synchrony of vocal fold abduction and a reduction of the negative inspiratory intratracheal pressure were observed during electrical pacing. This represents a preliminary step in the development of an alternative approach to the patient with bilateral recurrent laryngeal nerve paralysis.
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D004285:Dogs; D004558:Electric Stimulation; D004567:Electrodes, Implanted; D004576:Electromyography; D005931:Glottis / Q000503:physiopathology; D007821:Laryngeal Muscles / Q000503:physiopathology*; D007823:Laryngeal Nerves / Q000503:physiopathology; D009132:Muscles / Q000503:physiopathology*; D012008:Recurrence; D014826:Vocal Cord Paralysis / Q000628:therapy*