VOICE HANDICAP INDEX (VHI) IN PARTIAL LARYNGECTOMY PATIENTS

Department of ENT,Hospital of SSK, İzmir, Türkey Voice handicap Index (VHI), This patient self-assessment consist of 10 items in three domains: emotional, physical and functional aspects. The functional subscale includes statements which describe the impact of a person’s voice on his daily activities. The emotional subscale indicates the patient’s affective responses to the voice disorder. The items in the physical subscale are statements that relate to either the patient’s perception of laryngeal discomfort or the voice output characteristics, such as the pitch being too low or too high. The VHI was designed to assess all types of voice disorders. In our study, we applied the VHI to partial laryngectomized patients. Though surgical technics were different, we assessed the patient’s perception of vocal handicap after surgery, and the functional, emotional or physiological impacts of their new-voices. There were no statistically significant difference between the VHI and VHI-F, VHI-P, VHI-E scores in 3 patient groups. All of the patients evaluated, that their new voices have similar functional, physical and emotional impact on their life. In all of our study group patients, the quality of voice was found to be sufficient to hold a normal individual conversation. Keywords : Voice Handicap Index, Partial Laryngectomy.