title: Impact of obturation of palatal fistulae on speech quality and aerodynamic parameters in patients with cleft palates.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  The aim of this prospective study was to measure nasal and oral airflow during speech, before and after obturation.
  
  
  METHODS
  Included were children aged 3-18 years with nonsyndromic clefts and palatal fistulae. The corpus used was: syllable /pi/; a sentence containing stop consonants and a nasal phoneme; and the description of a picture of a scene. Analysis criteria were: percentage of nasality; value of average flow for the explosion; perceived nasality and intelligibility; and tolerance of the proposed device.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Only 5 children were included due to the observation of an increase in the percentage of nasality after obturation. The value of average flow for the explosion increased in all patients. A decrease in perceived nasality was noted in all but 1 patient. An improvement in intelligibility was observed in 3 out of the 5 children. The tolerance of the device was good.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  While the small number of patients studied does not permit firm conclusions concerning the efficiency of the obturation, the method described, as well as the introduction of 'speed of explosion' of stop consonants, offer new perspectives to prospectively study obturator effects on speech.
authors.affiliation: Voice and Deglutition Unit, Department of Otorhinolaryngology and Head and Neck Surgery, University Hospital of Rangueil-Larrey, Toulouse, France.
authors.forename: Virginie
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Woisard
authors.forename: Emmanuelle
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Noirrit-Esclassan
authors.forename: Vanessa
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Vandrebeck
authors.forename: Anthony
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Al Hawat
authors.forename: Philippe
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Galinier
authors.forename: Frédéric
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Lauwers
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D002972:Cleft Palate / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D016155:Oral Fistula / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D010158:Palatal Obturators; D010700:Phonetics; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012123:Pulmonary Ventilation; D013065:Speech Intelligibility; D013068:Speech Production Measurement; D013070:Speech Therapy