Voice-related quality of life in patients after total and partial laryngectomy

Objective. To assess the voice-related quality of life (V-RQOL) in patients after total and partial laryngectomy. Materials and methods. 96 patients treated for laryngeal cancer were enrolled in the study. The cohort of patients was divided into three groups depending on the surgical procedure carried out: total laryngectomy (TL), supracricoid partial laryngectomy (SCL) and/or horizontal glottectomy (HG). The maximum phonation time (MPT) and syllable diadochokinesis, were used for the aerodynamic assessment; Yanagihara score was used for acoustic analysis of the sustained /a/ and the GRBAS scale was used for perceptual assessment. Each of the patients completed the VHI. The Kruskal–Wallis and Mann–Whitney tests were used to analyse the mean difference among the three groups of patients. Results. A comparison with the values found between groups noted that the TL group showed significantly higher scores of G, R and Yanagihara score, while the HG group showed a significantly higher score of B. No differences were found in the aerodynamic and acoustic measures among the 3 groups. The mean ± standard deviations of VHI total score were 35.3 ± 24.5 for TL group, 30.1 ± 21.6 for SCL group, 35.8 ± 9.6 for HG group. No significant difference was found across the three groups. Conclusions. V-RQOL seems to be similar in patients who underwent significantly different surgical procedures even if the voice characteristics were different. These findings need to be considered in patient's counselling together with other data on general quality of life after total and partial laryngectomy.