ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION: Chronic cough is a persistent cough lasting greater than eight weeks. The prevalence rate is estimated to be 9% to 33% in the United States. There are several treatment modalities described in current literature including medical, surgical, and behavioral interventions. Behavioral intervention with a speech-language pathologist (SLP) includes education on laryngeal hygiene and the voluntary control of cough as well as respiratory retraining to suppress or reduce the duration of cough. Cough suppression therapy, like other behavioral therapies, requires patient motivation and commitment to participation and completion in therapy. METHODS: This study was a prospective cross-sectional survey at a single academic institution. Adult patients evaluated by a laryngologist for chronic cough regardless of their primary etiology were included. Patients who were tracheostomy dependent, on oxygen therapy, had vocal fold paralysis/immobility, or had undergone previous laryngeal surgery were excluded. Patients were surveyed at the end of the initial clinic visit or at the beginning of the first cough suppression therapy session. Subjects reported their motivational factors for undergoing cough suppression therapy. RESULTS: The majority of patients, 21 (58.33%), identified as female, 15 patients (41.20%) identified as male, and no patients identified as transgender, nonbinary, and/or other gender. The patients in this study had a mean age of 57.75 (12.12) years. 35 patients (97.22%) were interested in cough suppression therapy. The mean presenting cough severity index (CSI) was 19.39 (10.28) with the mean cough duration of 8.69 (12.10) years. CONCLUSIONS: Patients primarily sought cough suppression therapy due to intrinsic factors rather than extrinsic influence. By understanding the relationship between symptomatology and patient motivation, clinicians can better counsel their patients and improve methods to assess candidacy for behavioral treatment.
ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVES: Globus pharyngeus (GP) is described as the subjective sensation of having a "lump" in the throat in the absence of correlating physical findings or dysphagia. Historically, despite the frequency of patient complaints, GP has been difficult to quantify with current outcome measures. This is in large part due to lack of a user-friendly, modernized, objective patient-reported outcome measure (PROM) of symptom severity. The aim of this study is to develop a modernized, practical, validated PROM for evaluating GP symptom severity. METHODS: The Laryngopharyngeal Measure of Perceived Sensation (LUMP questionnaire) was created in three phases: 1) item generation by an expert panel involving two laryngologists and two speech language pathologists developed from common patient-reported GP symptoms, with patient confirmation; 2) line-item reduction based on internal consistency and reliability; 3) and instrument validity, which was assessed by administering the questionnaire to patients complaining of GP as well as patients without GP. RESULTS: A 19-item questionnaire was developed from an expert panel, which was then administered to 110 patients, 100 of whom met inclusion criteria. After statistical analysis, less internally consistent or relevant questions were removed, leaving eight items with an internal consistency (Cronbach alpha) of 0.892. When administered to 54 patients with GP versus 31 normal patients, the mean score was found to be higher in those with GP versus normal patients (P value <0.0001). CONCLUSION: Preliminary results suggest the eight-item LUMP questionnaire is a valuable PROM for evaluating GP symptom severity. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: NA Laryngoscope, 2019.