Comparison of Voice Therapy and Antireflex Therapy in the Treatment of Laryngopharyngeal Reflux-related Hoarseness: A Prospective Randomized Control Trial

Hoarseness is one of the most common presenting complaints in otolaryngology. The differential diagnosis for hoarseness is board, but a large percentage has been attributed to laryngopharyngeal reflux (LPR). LPR refers to the symptomatic effects of regurgitated gastric contents into the pharynx and larynx.1-3 1,2 Although dual-probe 24 hour pH monitoring is the gold standard in the diagnosis of LPR, it is not always performed due to inconvenience and cost. Patients are commonly treated based on history and physical examination findings alone. The literature on the efficacy of anti-reflux therapy and LPR is controversial. Karkos et al performed a systematic review on the use of empiric treatment of proton pump inhibitors (PPI) in patients suspected of having LPR and found no statistically significant difference between patients treated with PPI and those treated with placebo in reference to symptom severity or frequency of presumed reflux events. 2 Commonly patients are started on empiric therapy with anti-reflux medications and lifestyle modifications. Laryngoscopy is performed on all patients presenting with dysphonia. While a variety of findings have been characterized as consistent with reflux a study performed by Hicks et al, found that 86% of normal volunteers had findings consistent with reflux on flexible laryngoscopy.5 This calls into question the sensitivity and specificity of laryngoscopy in the diagnosis of LPR. Park et al performed a study comparing the effectiveness of anti-reflux therapy alone versus a combination of voice therapy with PPI in the treatment of presumed LPR-related dysphonia, and found combination therapy to be superior to anti-reflux therapy alone. 3 Because there are no studies comparing voice therapy directly with anti-reflux therapy, one cannot determine whether the improvements are due to augmentation of anti-reflux therapy with voice therapy, or if voice therapy alone is superior in the treatment of LPR-related dysphonia. There are currently no studies comparing the effectiveness of voice therapy alone, anti-reflux therapy alone, and combination therapy. Patients who present with dysphonia may be over treated with anti-reflux medications. These medications are not without side effects. It is hypothesized that a subset of patients who are thought to have reflux related dysphonia are misusing their voice and can be successfully treated with voice therapy alone. This study will be a prospective, randomized, unblinded but controlled trial. Patients presenting to the Otolaryngology clinic who are diagnosed with LPR-related dysphonia who meet inclusion criteria will be eligible to enroll in the study and will be randomized to one of the three treatment arms. Reflux symptom index (RSI) scores, reflux finding scores (RFS), voice handicap index-10 (VHI-10) scores, and consensus auditory perceptual evaluation-voice (CAPE-V) scores will be compared prior to initiation of therapy as well as at 1, 2, and 3 months following initiation of treatment.