Effects of Tonsillectomy on Articulation.

Effects of adenotonsillectomy on speech spectrum in children

“…Other experiences suggest that hypertrophic tonsils and adenoids may contribute to hypernasality and that tonsillectomy with adenoidectomy contributes more to postoperative changes of nasalance than adenoidectomy alone (nasalance represents a measure of relative amount of oral and nasal acoustic energy exhibited by a speaker; it is intended to serve as an objective measure of perceived nasality); unfortunately because the patients are not able to repeat the same manner of voice production before and after adenotonsillectomy, in these reports the indicators of the effects of surgery on vocal function are limited to airway resistance measures and subjective rating scales [5][6][7].…”

The Effects of Adenoidectomy and Tonsillectomy on Speech and Nasal Resonance

“…Given the fact that vowels are mainly determined by F 1 and F 2 , the decrease in F 3 explains why perceptual speech evaluation did not point out changes in articulation. Hori et al [36] concluded that post-tonsillectomy articulatory alterations may be considered to be inappreciable in clinical practice.…”

“…Peterson-Falzone [2] confirmed that velopharyngeal inadequacy following tonsillectomy is rare. The effects of tonsillectomy on articulation were examined by Hori et al [36] in 40 patients before and after surgery. Studying the formant frequencies of 5 Japanese vowels disclosed that only the third formant (F 3 ) decreased remarkably (in particular for /o/).…”

Effects of Tonsillectomy on Voice Assessment

“…Hori et al (4) noted that the changes in articulation were considered to be negligible in clinical practice. Chuma et al (1) reported that it had only minimal impact on quantitative and qualitative aspect of vocal function.…”

“…(3,4,5,6) Tonsillectomy can modify the shape of the vocal tract by enlarging the resonating chamber and by altering the formant frequencies or by altering conformation of tonsillar fossa. (1,4) With respect to the supralaryngeal factors if extirpation of soft tissue from the oropharynx altered the anatomy of the supralaryngeal acoustic transmission pathway and possibly the dynamics of physiologic function, the acoustic measures related to vocal tract resonance could be changed. (1) With regard to vocal assessment in our study of vowels /a/, /i/ and /u/ under the category: Hoarse, Harsh and Breathy; the results were found to be not statistically significant.…”