Development of an IoT Cloud System to Support Continuity of Voluntary Practice in Rehabilitation of Patients with Voice Disorders

Abstract

  In the rehabilitation of voice disorders, patients were required to keep daily exercise at home as instructed by speech-language-hearing therapists; however, few systems have been developed to support their voluntary and continued practice. This study thus developed a small and low-cost system to support rehabilitation using tube phonation, which has already been shown to be effective in the field of voice disorders, using the skin vibration of the lips as a quantitative index. The system provides real-time visual feedback of the vibration index during tube phonation and notifies the user of practice results and reminders via social networking service (SNS). The results of an effectiveness test of the system showed that the visual feedback and the automatic notification function via SNS contributed to the appropriateness and continuity of the voluntary practice.