Eur Arch Otorhinolaryngol (2009) 266:1753–1757 DOI 10.1007/s00405-009-0991-y 123 LARYNGOLOGY Vocal fold surgery of benign inXammatory lesions of Reinke’s space: an outcome study in 47 subjects Joost J. S. van Dinther · Marc De Bodt · Floris L. Wuyts · Paul H. Van de Heyning Received: 23 September 2008 / Accepted: 29 April 2009 / Published online: 16 May 2009  Springer-Verlag 2009 Abstract Phonosurgery should lead to a better voice quality and a better quality of life. Only a few studies report outcome of phonosurgery in terms of stroboscopic, percep- tual, aerodynamic, acoustic and self-rating data. The proto- col as proposed by the European Laryngological Society (ELS; Dejonckere et al. in Arch Otorhinolaryngol 258:77– 82, 2001) complies with this condition. A group of 47 patients who underwent phonosurgery was pre- and postop- eratively assessed by means of the ELS protocol in order to evaluate postoperative outcome. Analysis of the data showed a signiWcant improvement for all dimensions mea- sured by stroboscopic parameters (glottic closure, mucosal wave, regularity and symmetry), perceptual voice quality (GRBAS), voice handicap index and the dysphonia severity index which represents both aerodynamic as acoustical measurements. In general, the signiWcant improvement for a subgroup of exudative lesions of Reinke’s space is more pronounced than for a subgroup with structural/congenital lesions. Keywords Vocal fold surgery · Outcome · ELS protocol · DSI Introduction One of the main goals of phonosurgery is to improve the patient’s quality of life in general and voice quality in particular. Only a few studies analyzed the outcome after phonosurgery. Murry and Rosen [1] showed that the voice handicap index (VHI) [2] improved signiWcantly in a group of 13 patients with vocal fold polyps and cysts. No other outcome measures were included in their study. Glicklich et al. [3] used the voice outcome survey (VOS) to evaluate the clinical changes in patients with medialization after vocal fold paralysis. The VOS seemed to be the most reli- able measurement related to the subscales of the SF-36. Spector et al. [4] used the SF-36, VHI and VOS to evaluate outcome for a similar group of unilateral vocal cord paraly- sis. They concluded that patient perception improved sig- niWcantly after surgery (medialization). Hogikyan et al. [5– 7] validated and used the V-RQOL as a measure of voice- related quality of life in thyroplasty for unilateral vocal fold paralysis and spasmodic dysphonia. The same question- naire was used to compare outcome between diVerent types of laryngectomy by Weinstein et al. [8]. Outcome can be evaluated by means of the basic proto- col for voice assessment as proposed by the ELS in 2001 by Dejonckere et al. [9]. The purpose of this protocol is to allow relevant comparisons with the literature when pre- senting or publishing the results of voice treatment, e.g. phonosurgical techniques. A practical classiWcation system for phonosurgery was proposed by the ELS in 2007 by Friedrich et al. [10] in order to establish a common lan- guage for reporting results. The ELS basic protocol for voice assessment [9] is a multidimensional set of minimal basic measurements suitable for all common dysphonias. In this study we focus on pre- and postsurgery diVerences in videolaryngostroboscopic evaluation, perceived voice quality, dysphonia severity index (DSI) [11] and VHI, adapted and validated for the Dutch language [12], for a group of patients with benign inXammatory lesions of Reinke’s space. J. J. S. van Dinther (&) · M. De Bodt · F. L. Wuyts · P. H. Van de Heyning Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Head and Neck Surgery and Communication Disorders, Antwerp University Hospital, University of Antwerp, Wilrijkstraat 10, 2650 Edegem, Belgium e-mail: joost.van.dinther@telenet.be