Respiratory Dynamics of Young Vocally Healthy Women during Phonatory Tasks for Vocal Function Assessment: Normative Data for Clinical Practice

• Grant number: 23/18154-6
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: April 01, 2024
• End date: December 31, 2024
• Field of knowledge: Health Sciences - Speech Therapy
• Principal Investigator: Rosiane Kimiko Yamasaki Odagima
• Grantee: Anne Gabriele Lima Theodoro
• Host Institution: Escola Paulista de Medicina (EPM). Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP). Campus São Paulo. São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: Young adults correspond to the period of greatest vocal stability. Although there are many studies on the vocal production of young adults, few have explored the respiratory dynamics of this population during the performance of specific tasks for the assessment of vocal functionality, such as those in the dynamic vocal analysis (DVA). These tasks involve emissions with variations in frequency and intensity. OBJECTIVES: 1. Investigate the respiratory dynamics of vocally healthy young women during the performance of tasks in the dynamic vocal analysis (DVA) using respiratory inductance plethysmography. 2. Establish normative data for the respiratory dynamics of young women during tasks involving frequency and intensity variations. METHOD: A prospective, cross-sectional, and observational study will be conducted. Thirty-six young adult women aged 18 to 45 will participate in the research. Participants will perform the following phonatory tasks: continuous speech emission with counting from 1 to 20 at habitual, weak, and strong intensities, and sustained vowel "é" with frequency variation (habitual, high, and low) and intensity variation (weak and strong), performed at maximum phonation time. Inductance plethysmography will be used for respiratory dynamics analysis, employing three respiratory belts - one positioned at the axillary level (expansibility of the upper thoracic region), one at the floating ribs region (expansibility of the diaphragmatic region), and another at the abdominal region. Plethysmography parameters include the quantity and duration of respiratory cycles during number counting and amplitude measurements of inspiratory and expiratory movements during connected speech and sustained vowel tasks, recorded in mV. For reproducibility analysis, tasks will be repeated twice consecutively. METHOD OF ANALYZING RESULTS: Comparative and reproducibility analyses will be conducted, and normative data for clinical practice will be obtained. These data can be used for comparison with young women with dysphonia.