A Case of Pulmonary Tuberculosis Misconceived as Functional Dysphonia

ABSTRACT

Functional dysphonia (FD) refers to a voice disorder without any anatomical or neurologic pathology affecting the larynx. The beginning of a diagnosis of FD is to differentiate the patient’s voice symptoms from other organic voice disorders and other functional voice problems. Pulmonary tuberculosis initially presented by voice change is very rare. This atypical presentation might cause some confusion due to other more common diseases. We report a case of pulmonary tuberculosis as initial presentation of dysphonia in a 16-year-old girl. The patient was referred to our hospital with a gradually worsening dysphonia for 6 months. At first, it was misdiagnosed as FD because there was no specific finding on stroboscopy. One month later, she was finally diagnosed as pulmonary tuberculosis due to fever and pleuritic pain. After antituberculous therapy, her symptoms and voice have improved.