A case of voice therapy for mutational dysphonia after type Ⅲ thyroplasty

Abstract

We experienced a case in which a patient showed voice improvement with voice therapy after receiving thyroplasty due to mutational dysphonia. A 41-year-old man visited our institution for mutational falsetto as a chief complaint. We also found that his voice pitch was higher than that of junior high school students. After elderly people at work had pointed out that they had difficulty hearing him, he underwent type Ⅲ thyroplasty at a different institution. However, because his voice pitch had not stabilized by three months after surgery, we performed voice therapy. He focused on humming during voice rehabilitation. Since he markedly produced mutational falsetto in the low-pitched sound training, we stabilized his voice as a slightly higher-pitched sound and then gradually helped him produce a low-pitched sound. After the voice therapy, his mutational falsetto had disappeared, and his voice pitch had stabilized at a normal speaking fundamental frequency.