Objective
To characterise the burden of voice disorders in teachers in a UK population, compare it with non‐teachers and identify groups of teachers who may be particularly at risk of developing a voice problem.
Design
Questionnaire‐based survey of primary and secondary school teachers and non‐teachers. Questions consisted of general demographics, VHI‐10 and questions relating to voice problems.
Methods
Distribution of questionnaires to teachers and non‐teachers and statistical analysis of the responses.
Setting
University teaching hospital.
Participants
Teachers and non‐teachers in a region of North West England.
Main outcome measures
Identification of risk factors for voice problems in teachers, compared to non‐teachers.
Results
A total of 210 primary and 244 secondary school teachers and 304 non‐teachers participated in the questionnaire survey. Response rates were 67.9% from primary schools, 41.2% from secondary schools and 40.0% from the non‐teachers. 30.0% of teachers and 9.0% of non‐teachers had reported problems with their voice. 12.8% of teachers and 2.0% of non‐teachers had missed work due to voice problems. 14.1% of teachers and 5.3% non‐teachers had seen a general practitioner for voice‐related problems, whilst 7.1% of teachers and 6.3% of non‐teachers had been referred to an otolaryngologist or speech therapist for voice problems. Factors related to VHI‐10 (P < .05) were identified.
Conclusions
Voice disorders are an occupational health problem for teachers, with a significant burden of these disorders in this group of teachers in the UK. We have identified risk factors that could be exploited to identify groups of teachers who would benefit from early intervention.
The GRBAS scale is a widely used subjective measure of voice quality. The aim of this paper is to investigate the correlation between the 'grade', 'roughness', 'breathiness', 'asthenia' and 'strain' dimensions of this scale and the objective measurements provided by the 'Analysis of Dysphonia in speech and Voice' (ADSV) software package. To do this, voice recordings of 107 samples were collected in a quiet room, and each voice was perceptually evaluated on the GRBAS scale by three experienced speech and language therapists. The same recordings were also acoustically analysed using ADSV. Statistical analysis using the Spearman's rank correlation coefficient model identified a degree of moderate correlation between the result of cepstral based analysis and the GRBAS scale. A classifier such as a decision tree may then be applied to the ADSV cepstral measurement for the objective prediction of GRBAS scores. The accuracy of the classifier in predicting the score of each therapist is given in the paper.
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