Development of a Portable Voice Monitor with Biofeedback

描述（由申请人提供）：最常见的声音障碍是慢性的 或可能因错误和/或滥用而导致的反复出现的情况 声音行为模式这种基于行为的障碍很难被 由于缺乏能力， 进行长期监测，并在外部提供有意义的反馈， 临床语音治疗的情况。为应付这方面的需要，我们建议制定一套 用于评估和治疗嗓音的流动监测和反馈系统 疾病，可以：（1）可靠和不引人注目地提供长期，连续 跟踪发声功能的重要参数，以及（2）提供反馈， 当语音参数超过“安全”限制和/或目标发声时， 行为没有得到维持。 拟议项目将侧重于进一步发展现有的 原型仪器，被称为便携式声乐累加器（PVA），进入 一个临床上有用的系统，遵循两个平行的，相关的线， 发展其中一个目标是启动PVA的基于组的临床试验 （a）制定抽样战略，以可靠地估计“典型”语音使用情况 用于未来的临床和研究应用;（B）确定机械 （c）评估器械的可靠性和受试者耐受性; 可靠跟踪常见语音障碍患者的语音功能的设备; (d)开始评价动态嗓音监测的临床有效性 通过比较正常和语音障碍之间的结果，与PVA设备一起使用 组 第二个主要目标是实施和测试新功能，包括： 改进的生物反馈能力，（B）将改进的软件界面， 为临床医生下载和解释数据;（c）开发数字化 信号处理算法，以从信号中提取附加的相关信息。 加速度计信号。 从长远来看，PVA的临床应用有望改善诊断 和治疗最常见类型的声音障碍，其中 识别有害的声音使用模式和/或遵守声乐 再培训方案被认为是有效管理的关键要素。它 还预计PVA将提供前所未有的研究能力， 直接调查和测试的病因和治疗的基本理论， 许多常见的声音障碍。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The most common voice disorders are chronic or recurring conditions that are likely to result from faulty and/or abusive vocal behavior patterns. Such behaviorally based disorders are difficult to accurately assess, and effectively rehabilitate, because of a lack of capability to perform long-term monitoring and provide meaningful feedback outside of the clinical voice-therapy situation. To address this need, we propose to develop an ambulatory monitoring and feedback system for evaluating and treating voice disorders that can: (1) reliably and unobtrusively provide long-term, continuous tracking of important parameters of vocal function, and (2) provide feedback to the user when voice parameters exceed 'safe' limits and/or target phonatory behaviors are not maintained. The proposed project will focus on further developing an already existing prototype instrument, referred to as the Portable Vocal Accumulator (PVA), into a clinically useful system by following two parallel, related lines of development. One aim will be to initiate group-based clinical trials of the PVA to: (a) develop sampling strategies for reliably estimating "typical" voice use for future clinical and research applications; (b) determine mechanical reliability and subject tolerance of the device; (c) assess the ability of the device to reliably track vocal function in patients with common voice disorders; (d) begin to evaluate the clinical validity of ambulatory monitoring of voice use with the PVA device by comparing results between normal and voice-disordered groups. The second main aim is to implement and test new features, including: (a) improved biofeedback capabilities, (b) a software interface that will improve data downloading and interpretation for clinicians; (c) development of digital signal processing algorithms to extract additional relevant information from the accelerometer signal. In the long-term, clinical use of the PVA is expected to improve the diagnosis and treatment of the most common types of voice disorders in which the identification of harmful patterns of voice use and/or compliance with vocal retraining regimens are considered critical elements to effective management. It is also expected that the PVA will provide unprecedented research capability to directly investigate and test basic theories about the etiology and treatment of many common voice disorders.