Preschool Speech Outcomes after Palatoplasty of Patients－Examination of the Usefulness of Nasometry－

Abstract

To determine pre‑school speech outcomes after palatoplasty in the Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery Department of Yamaguchi University Hospital, we performed speech evaluation and nasometry examination.

As subjects, 8 boys and 11 girls with cleft palate who visited our department from August 2006 to November 2017 and underwent palatoplasty were included. Nasometry was performed with assessment of the presence or absence of hypernasality and nasal emission, and the presence or absence and type of abnormal articulation.

Four patients（21.1%） showed hypernasality, and among abnormal articulations, glottal stop and nasopharyngeal snort were observed in 2（ 10.5% ） and 6（ 31.6% ） patients, respectively. Six patients （ 31.6% ） had nasal emission. Mean nasalance scores were 54.3% and 20.9% for patients with and w ithout hypernasality, 40.2% and 22.2% for patients with and without nasal emission, and 42.4% and 17.4% for patients with and without abnormal articulations. Among the patients with abnormal articulations, mean nasalance scores were 54.5% for patients with glottal stop and 38.3% for patients w ith nasopharyngeal snort.

Thus, nasometry can be considered as a useful examination to reflect nasopharyngeal closure function and articulatory function in patients with cleft palate after palatoplasty.