A Study of the Availability and Parameters of Videokymography

Ahn, Cheol Min; Chung, Duk Hee

Abstract

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Examining vibrations of the vocal fold is very important in patients with voice changes. The newly developed videokymography (VKG) takes images in real time and records irregular vibrations of the vocal fold. However, there are few data on VKG findings. We studied VKG to evaluate the vibratory characteristics of the vocal fold in benign vocal fold lesions and normal subjects. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Normal subjects (N=20) and patients (N=100) with laryngeal lesions were evaluated. Unique vibratory patterns, blurred demarcation of the mucosal propagation, decreased margin amplitudes, asymmetry in phase or amplitude, and different contact sites were observed in each benign vocal-fold lesion.
RESULTS
There were several differences between subjects with normal and with laryngeal lesion. VKG depicted the tiny difference which were not exactly found by the stroboscope.
CONCLUSIONS
We found that each type of laryngeal lesion has specific characteristics which can be revealed by VKG examination. These characteristics could be quantified and used to objectively evaluate VKG findings. This research shows that VKG can be used as a supplementary diagnostic tool.