Voice and Swallowing Clinic

Welcome to the multidisciplinary voice and swallowing clinic of the UCSF Children's Communication Center. Our mission is to provide comprehensive assessment and treatment of your child's voice, resonance, and swallowing. Your child will be seen in an interdisciplinary clinic by a fellowship-trained pediatric otolaryngologist and a speech-language pathologist with specialized training in pediatric voice, resonance and swallowing. We also work closely with the Voice and Swallowing Center of the UCSF Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery.

Voice

Changes in voice quality can present in various forms. Your child may experience hoarseness after a soccer game or voice loss after sleeping over at a friend’s house. Voice conditions seen, but not limited to:

  • Hoarseness
  • Benign vocal fold lesions including nodules, polyps and cysts
  • Vocal fold paresis/paralysis
  • Paradoxical vocal fold motion and chronic or habit cough
  • Evaluation and therapy for the singing voice

Resonance

Voice changes can also manifest in a ‘nasaly’ sound with sound and air leaking through the nose. This is known as a change in resonance. Resonant conditions seen, but not limited to:

  • Hyper- or hyponasality
  • Nasal regurgitation
  • Velopharyngeal insufficiency

Swallowing

Some children have difficulty eating and swallowing. This may be related to an aversion to specific textures or to choking on certain foods or liquids. Feeding and swallowing conditions seen but not limited to:

  • Feeding difficulty
  • Choking or coughing on foods or liquids
  • Aspiration

Depending on your child’s specific needs, the assessment may include auditory-perceptual voice and resonance evaluation, evaluation of speech sounds, nasopharyngoscopy, flexible laryngoscopy, videostroboscopy, or flexible endoscopic evaluation of swallowing (FEES). If further swallowing evaluation is required a modified barium swallow study (MBSS) may be completed by our speech pathologist.

For medically complex children with additional sub-specialty needs, the multidisciplinary Pediatric Aerodigestive Clinic is available including concurrent specialty care from pediatric otolaryngology, speech-language pathology, pediatric gastroenterology and pulmonology.

We offer a comprehensive array of medical, surgical, and behavioral therapy interventions for voice, resonance and swallowing disorders identified upon diagnostic evaluation, including, but not limited to:

Medical/Surgical

  • Microdirect laryngoscopy/bronchoscopy
  • Microphonosurgery with or without laser
  • Medialization laryngoplasty
  • Surgery for velopharyngeal insufficiency, including palatoplasty and sphincter pharyngoplasty
  • Endoscopic airway surgery
  • Laryngotracheal reconstruction

Behavioral Therapy

  • Voice
  • Speech
  • Feeding and swallowing
 

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