Arytenoid Adduction and Thyroplasty on 22 Cases of Unilateral Vocal Cord Paralysis

Sung Wan Byun, Chun Dong Kim, Soon Kwan Hong

Copyright ⓒ 1998. Ewha Womans University School of Medicine. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Published Online: Sep 30, 1998

Abstract

Objectives

This study was performed to compare postoperative results of thyroplasty typeI and arytenoid adduction, which were recent phonosurgical procedures for the management of unilateral vocal cord paralysis.

Methods

Twenty-two cases of unilateral vocal cord paralysis with several etiologies were managed with thyroplasty typeI and/or arytenoid adduction. The subjective and MPT(maximum phonation time) improvements after those procedures were compared statistically.

Results

The cause of paralysis were idiopathic(7 cases), thoracic lesion(6 cases) thyroidectomy(3 cases), neck mass excision(3 cases), neck trauma(2 cases) and diphtheria(case). The left side(15 cases) was paralyzed more frequently than the right(7 cases). There were significant increase(p=0.006) in MPT from 4 seconds preoperatively to 6 seconds postoperatively in thyrolasty cases, and also significant increase(p=0.014) from 5 seconds to 10.5 seconds in arytenoid adduction cases. Better result were observed in subjective improvement and MPT(p=0.0011) with arytenoid adduction. There was no significant complication.

Conclusion

Both arytenoid adduction and thyroplasty were effective and safe phonosurgical procedures for unilateral vocal cord paralysis. Better results were observed in arytenoid add-uction cases.

Keywords: Phonosurgery; Thyroplasty; Arytenoid adduction; Vocal cord paralysis