Abstract
Owing to the development of medical technology, devices to assess resonance (hypernasality and hyponasality) which result from conditions such as cleft palate and brain injury are being studied. In general, nasometric instruments are used to support clinical judgments of these disorders. For conventional separation-type nasometric instruments, there is an acoustic feedback effect between oral and nasal sounds. Recently, a mask-type nasometric instrument was developed for acoustic feedback insensitivity, but it has not yet been popularized. In this study, we analyzed the acoustic characteristics of the mask-type structure according to existing nasometric instruments. We evaluated the acoustic collection characteristics of the structure through the lumped-element model with an electromechanical-equivalent circuit. The analysis confirmed that the optimum area of the acoustic hole was obtained and a closed-type mask structure could be designed. In addition, we obtained voice data from a healthy control group and examined significant differences in the structure of the separation-type and mask-type nasometric instruments. Consequently, we confirmed a significant difference in nasalance according to the acoustic collection structure of the nasometric instruments.
Highlights
With the development of medical technology, interest in rehabilitation welfare is increasing and various rehabilitation devices are being researched and developed [1,2,3,4,5]
We investigated the structural problems of conventional separation plate-type nasometric instruments and the effect of acoustic feedback between the oral and nasal cavities
Wetone analyzed the of a conventional instrument structure the structural problems of the separation plate-type nasometric instrument
Summary
With the development of medical technology, interest in rehabilitation welfare is increasing and various rehabilitation devices are being researched and developed [1,2,3,4,5]. Speech therapy devices are increasingly attracting attention owing to rehabilitation and welfare support for people with communication disabilities such as hearing impairments. Individuals with cleft palate, and those who have dysarthria following a brain impairment, may present with hypernasal speech (too much nasal resonance). Nasometric instruments have been utilized by speech therapists to measure the degree of nasalance in speech [8,9,10,11]. In the case of separation-type nasometric instruments (e.g., NAS-1 separator, Glottal Enterprises, Syracuse NY, USA), the signal processing technique and effect of acoustic feedback on the microphone, which captures the nasal cavity, are insufficient. A closed mask-type device (NAS-1 Mask, Glottal Enterprises) was introduced to minimize the interference effects of oral and nasal sounds
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