Adductor spasmodic dysphonia and muscular tension dysphonia: acoustic analysis of sustained phonation and reading.
Acoustic phonatory events were identified in 10 women diagnosed with adductor spasmodic dysphonia (ADSD) and compared to 5 women and 5 men diagnosed with muscle tension dysphonia (MTD). The three acoustic parameters examined during sustained vowel production and reading included phonatory breaks, aperiodicity, and frequency shifts. Intra- and intermeasurer correlations showed high reliability for the measures. Findings indicated that those with ADSD produced a greater number of aberrant acoustic events than those with MTD. The results suggested that: (1) only those with ADSD show evidence of phonatory breaks during vocalization, albeit a sustained vowel or voicing during reading; (2) those with ADSD demonstrate greater variation in the type of aberrant acoustic events produced as a function of speech task. The latter point suggests that control of the larynx varies as a function of task demand, a finding not evident in the functionally based disorder of MTD. MTD is a disorder that often presents itself in a similar clinical manner to ADSD because of its perceptual commonalties and resembling laryngoscopic characteristics. The acoustic analysis presented in this study could be used as a method to assist in distinguishing between the two disorder types.
Sapienza
C M
CM
Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, University of Florida, Gainesville 32607, USA. Sapienza@csd.ufl.edu
Walton
S
S
Murry
T
T
D000162:Acoustics; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009119:Muscle Contraction; D010699:Phonation; D010700:Phonetics; D011932:Reading; D014831:Voice / Q000502:physiology; D014832:Voice Disorders / Q000145:classification* / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology*