The irradiated larynx and voice: a perceptual study.

The voices of patients with laryngeal cancer following a specific radiotherapy regimen were subjected to perceptual evaluation. Interval scaling of the severity of perceived dysphonia was completed for the voices of male patients sampled before and 1 year following radiation therapy and for a set of male controls. Eight listeners did this quantitative rating and also specified the predominant quality in each voice. The results indicated that the degree of dysphonia in the pretreatment group was highest. Radiotherapy decreased this dysphonia but not to the point that posttreatment voices were indistinguishable from those of normal subjects. Also, the voice qualities of laryngeal cancer patients shifted toward those of the control group following radiotherapy with over one half of the irradiated patients judged to have rough or normal qualities.