Objective and Subjective Evaluations of the Effects of Different Types of Intubation Tube Applications on Voice Performance in the Early Postoperative Period

VOICE CONDITION FOLLOWING SHORT-TERM ENDOTRACHEAL INTUBATION IN HEAD AND NECK SURGERY: STUDY PROTOCOL FOR CLINICAL TRIAL

Endotracheal intubation is an airway management procedure commonly performed under general anesthesia. It is linked with postoperative voice changes. The incidence and reasons of hoarseness and vocal cord injury are not very well investigated, especially after short-term anesthesia and intubation in head and neck surgery. The aim of the study is to identify the causes of voice changes after short endotracheal anesthesia in head and neck surgery. The study will include patients scheduled for head and neck surgery under general anesthesia with endotracheal intubation up to 3 hours. There will be 3 groups of patients, as follows: thyroid surgery, non-thyroid surgery, and control group undergoing surgery outside head and neck. Videostroboscopy will be recorded before and after surgery. Further diagnostic workup will include voice status; subjective voice self-analysis; perceptive and objective acoustic voice analysis at 4 time points (preoperatively, postoperative day 2, 2 weeks and 1 month after surgery). Endotracheal intubation is a safe method of airway management although it can temporarily alter a patient's voice quality. It is not known how much of this is the result of anesthesia, general condition of the patient, or surgery. This trial is expected to shed some light on this issue.

The Effect of Different Types of Laryngeal Mask Airways on Sound Quality: A Prospective Randomized Study

Background

Although the deterioration in sound quality is not as much as endotracheal intubation, it can also be seen after the use of laryngeal mask airway (LMA). The aim of this study is to investigate the effects of different LMA types on voice performance.

Methods

This study included 88 patients aged 18-80 years, whose surgical procedure was not planned to take longer than 120 minutes. In the acoustic voice analysis, F0, jitter%, and shimmer% were examined. In addition, the Voice Handicap Index (VHI)-30 questionnaire has completed an evaluation of voice quality. The patients were randomly divided into two groups (I-gel LMA [n=44]; Classic LMA [n=44]) according to the closed envelope method.

Results

A total of 88 patients were included in the study. Demographic data of the patients were statistically similar between the groups (p > 0.05). The changes in the preoperative and postoperative F0, jitter, and VHI-30 values in the I-gel group were statistically significant (p: 0.002, p: 0.001, p < 0.001). Shimmer values were not significantly different (p: 0.762). In the classical LMA group, preoperative and postoperative F0, jitter, shimmer, and VHI-30 values were statistically significantly different (p: 0.001, p: 0.012, p: 0.036, p < 0.001).

Conclusion

I-gel LMA and classic LMA negatively affect voice performance in the preoperative and postoperative periods. This situation was also observed in the VHI-30 index test. However, when this situation was evaluated in terms of shimmer analysis, the decrease in voice quality in the early postoperative period was more limited in the I-gel group.