Objective and Subjective Voice Examination in Korean Medicine

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Objectives: When a person speaks, voice problems usually include pain or discomfort and/or difficulties in terms of the pitch, the loudness and the quality of the voice. When patients with voice problems induced by stroke, Parkinson’s disease, and systemic diseases involving the voice are examined, generally, of the Four Diagnoses (四診), a Diagnosis of Hearing can be used in current Korean medicine. The effects of acupuncture and herb medicine on voice problems have been reported for over 20 years. However, when it comes to improvements, objective and subjective evaluation methods need to be explained.
Methods: Subjective methods for evaluating voice were studied through a literature search of old medicinal books containing Korean medicine diagnostics, and an objective evaluation method using Praat software is presented.
Results: Korean medicine doctors analyze the patient’s voice in clinical settings unconsciously on a daily basis. However, most voice diagnoses depend on the doctor’s subjective evaluation. Voice qualities can be evaluated by using the Eight Principles (八綱), including Yin-Yang; the Five Elements (Phases); the Grade, Roughness, Breathy, Asthenic, Strained (GRBAS) score, and the Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) as subjective methods, and an acoustic analysis using the Praat program can be used as an objective method.
Conclusion: A more complete voice examination can be achieved by using subjective and objective methods at the same time. For an objective explanation and management of patient’s voice problems or systemic disorders, an objective method should be used in Korean medicine, which already has many subjective diagnostic methods. More research needs to be conducted, and more clinical evidence needs to be collected in the future.

참고문헌 (Reference)

1 하기종, "五音 표준화를 위한 중국 ＂五音＂ 治療音樂의 분석" 대한동의병리학회 16 (16): 4-1109, 2002

2 백유상, "『黃帝內經』과 『樂學軌範』의 五音과 五聲에 대한 考察" 대한한의학원전학회 21 (21): 103-118, 2008

3 Japanese association of voice speech medicine, "Voice examination (clinical)" Koon Ja Publishing Inc 188-193, 1996

4 Hirose K., "Use of prosodic features for speech recognition" Interspeech 1445-1448, 2004

5 Li G., "Treatise on the spleen and stomach(脾胃論)" Oju Publishing Co 118-, 1969

6 Joo MB., "Traditional chinese medicine diagnostics (中 醫診斷學)" China press of traditional Chinese medicine 91-, 2002

7 Yang BG., "Theory and reality of voice analysis using praat" Mansu Publishing 21-, 2002

8 Carole TF., "Speech science" SIGMA PRESS 9-258, 2007

9 Man J., "Manifestation of pediatrics (幼科發揮)" China Press of Traditional Chinese Medicine 5-, 2007

10 Li C., "Introduction to medicine (醫學入門)" Dae Seong Publishing 210-, 1994

11 Heo J., "Dongeui science institute, treasured mirror of eastern medicine (東醫寶鑑)" Humanist 682-, 2002

12 "Classic of difficult issues" people’smedical publishing House 85-, 1989

13 Lee SW., "Acoustic phonetics in korean academy of speech-language pathology and audiology. audiology for speech care professionals" Koon Ja PublishingInc 37-, 2002

14 Ray DK., "Acoustic analysis of speech, 2nd ed" Pakhaksa 19-, 2007

15 Zhang JB., "Accessory wing of classified classic(類經附 翼). 2nd ed" Hae-dong Medical Publishing 85-, 2001

16 Yu JS., "A study on the sasang constitutional diagnosis by perceptual voice analysis" 16 (16): 46-58, 2004