Beschreibung:
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:sec><jats:title>Objective</jats:title><jats:p>COVID‐19 has radically changed medical practice. The main objective of this study was to assess the impact of surgical mask (SM) on voice quality analyzes in a group of patient with different common benign vocal organic pathologies.</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Study Design</jats:title><jats:p>A cross‐over study.</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Setting</jats:title><jats:p>A group of 20 patients with different organic benign vocal pathologies was recruited from the ENT consultation of the University Hospital of Charleroi in Belgium.</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Methods</jats:title><jats:p>On the day of the assessment, each subject underwent an endonasal laryngeal videostroboscopy followed by a voice analysis (VA) with and without a new SM. The following parameters were analyzed: fundamental frequency, maximum frequency, range in amplitude and frequency of the voice, jitter and maximum phonatory time.</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Results</jats:title><jats:p>In this research, we showed that VA can be performed with an SM while not changing the measured vocal parameters. These results also suggest that for the same individual a VA performed before the pandemic without SM could be compared to one with a SM to follow the patient's evolution of his or her voice quality.</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Conclusion</jats:title><jats:p>The wearing of an SM during VA should always be recommended in case of immunodeficiency, a contagious disease of the patient or during a (new) pandemic.</jats:p></jats:sec>