Speech Therapy

Speech Assessment and Therapy after Thyroid Surgery

A Multidisciplinary approach to voice recovery is an essential aspect after thyroid surgery. The risk of injury to the Recurrent Laryngeal Nerve resulting in vocal cord paralysis is minimal and happens in about 1% of the patients.

Temporal voice disturbance for several days after the surgery happens in about 15-20% of the patients and lasts for about 1 week. Appropriate voice use (not overuse after surgery) and post-surgery voice strengthening will speed recovery. It is possible with specially designed exercises developed by our speech therapy team at CentraSate Medical Center. Every patient will have an opportunity to see a speech therapist before (to document the baseline) and after the surgery. A small group of patients will have such complaints as “feel tired”, “feel sore”, inability to raise their voice, or shortness of breath while speaking. Those patients will benefit from a short course of speech therapy.

Speech pathologist during a therapy session with a patient after thyroid surgery