Phonetic features of patients with transoral endoscopic thyroidectomy

Objective: The objective of this study was to compare phonetic outcomes of TOETVA with those of conventional transcervical thyroidectomy(OPEN). Methods: Retrospective chart review of total 61 patients who received thyroidectomy through OPEN (n = 34) or TOETVA (n = 27) approach in single tertiary center were enrolled. Results: There were significant differences in F0 between the two groups and there were significant changes from different time points within each group in jitter for vowel /i/. Aerodynamically, there were significant differences in mean sound pressure level for vowel /a/ and mean sound pressure level, mean air pressure, and aerodynamic resistance for syllable /pa/ between the two groups. In subjective VHI evaluations, there were no significant differences between the two groups. Conclusion: This study is significant in that it has investigated voices of patients with TOETVA. Results of this study are expected to be useful for voice evaluation, treatment, and prevention in the future.