Age and Sex Comparison of Aerodynamic Phonation Measurements Using Noninvasive Assessment

Purpose The goal of this study was to present vocal aerodynamic measurements from pediatric and adult participant pools. There are a number of anatomical changes involving the larynx and vocal folds that occur as children age and become adults. Data were collected using two methods of noninvasive aerodynamic assessment: mechanical interruption and labial interruption. Method A total of 154 participants aged 4–24 years old took part in this study. Ten trials were performed for both methods of airway interruption. To perform mechanical interruption, participants phonated /α/ for 10 s trials while a balloon valve interrupted phonation 5 times. For labial interruption, participants said /pα/ 5 times at comfortable and quiet volumes. Aerodynamic measures included subglottal pressure, phonation threshold pressure, mean airflow, laryngeal resistance, and others. Results One hundred one participants (51 females) successfully completed testing with both methods. Eight out of 20 measurements were found to have a statistically significant effect of participant age on measurements. Sex alone had a significant effect on vocal efficiency for the labial quiet method. Conclusions The data discussed here can be used to view age and sex trends in vocal aerodynamic measurements. When using either method of mechanical or labial interruption, participant age needs to be taken into account to properly interpret several aerodynamic parameters. A participant's sex is not as important when using these methods.

Effect of Bhramari Pranayama on the Acoustic and Aerodynamic Parameters of Voice in Normophonic Females

Summary. Objective. Pranayama is known for improving various health conditions. The present study is aimed at investigating the effects of bhramari pranayama on aerodynamic and acoustic parameters of voice in healthy individuals. Study Design. This is a pretest-posttest design study. Methods. A total of 24 participants in the age range of 20 to 25 years completed the bhramari pranayama regimen for 30 sessions. Aerodynamic and acoustic assessments were done before and after pranayama sessions. Maximum phonation duration, pitch, loudness, subglottal pressure, glottal airflow, laryngeal resistance and conductance along with acoustical parameters such as average F0, jitter, and shimmer, soft phonation index, noise to harmonic ratio, cepstral peak prominence, and smoothened cepstral peak prominence were analysed. Results. The results revealed significant improvement in the maximum phonation duration, glottal airflow and pressure, average fundamental frequency, and cepstral peak prominence after practice suggesting that it has an effect on voice parameters. Conclusion. Bhramari pranayama is effective in improving the acoustic and aerodynamic parameters of voice. The same needs to be investigated in hyper- and hypofunctional voice disorders in the future studies.