New study on assessing treatment responses in laryngeal dystonia published

Jürgen Konczak, PhD, professor of biomechanics and neuromotor control in the School of Kinesiology and Director of the Human Sensorimotor Control Laboratory (HSCL), published with colleagues an article entitled, "Pitch Strength & Percent Vocal Creak to Assess Treatment Response in Adductor Laryngeal Dystonia," in the specialty journal Laryngoscope on acoustic markers associated with the voice disorder laryngeal dystonia. This form of focal dystonia is a chronic voice disorder without a cure and regular injections of Botulinum toxin is the major available treatment. However, treatment responses vary widely among affected people and may change over time in a patient. Unfortunately, standard voice assessment is labor-intensive and prone to error, thus complicating treatment decisions. This study examined whether several acoustic markers of voice can be good candidates to determine changes in voice quality due to Botulinum toxin treatment. It was found that these markers correlate with certain speech symptoms, but are not meaningful predictors of a treatment response. The lead author of the study is Jesse Hoffmeister, PhD, from the University's Department of Otolaryngology.