Idiopathic Subglottic Stenosis in Non-Caucasian Women.

Objective: To characterize presentation, disease course, and treatment of idiopathic subglottic stenosis (iSGS) in non-Caucasian women and compare this cohort to the predominantly female, Caucasian patient cohorts identified in the literature.

Study Design: Retrospective review. Results are compared to systematic review of demographics.

Decision-Making in the Treatment of Idiopathic Subglottic Stenosis: A Survey of Laryngologists.

Objective: Idiopathic subglottic stenosis (iSGS) is a rare condition involving the subglottic larynx and upper trachea, commonly affecting Caucasian females between 30 and 50 years of age. Despite its homogeneous presentation, clinical management for iSGS is yet to be standardized, leading to variability in outcomes between predominant interventions. In recognition of the heterogenicity in iSGS treatment and the need to improve patient outcomes, this study aimed to survey laryngologists to understand the factors influencing clinical decision-making and the incorporation of new treatment modalities for iSGS.

Comparative Treatment Outcomes for Idiopathic Subglottic Stenosis: 5-Year Update.

The North American Airway Collaborative (NoAAC) previously published a 3-year multi-institutional prospective cohort study showing variation in treatment effectiveness between 3 primary surgical techniques for idiopathic subglottic stenosis (iSGS). In this report, we update these findings to include 5 years of data evaluating treatment effectiveness. Patients in the NoAAC cohort were re-enrolled for 2 additional years and followed using the prespecified published protocol.

Serial In-Office Steroid Injections for Airway Stenosis: Long-Term Benefit and Cost Analysis.

Objectives: To evaluate the long-term benefit of serial in-office steroid injections (SISI) in the treatment of subglottic and proximal tracheal stenosis (SG/PTS). Evaluate cost of SISI compared to endoscopic dilation (ED).

Study Design: Retrospective study and cost analysis.

Neutral auditory words immediately followed by painful electric shock may show reduced next-day recollection.

In this study, we investigated the effect of experimentally delivered acute pain on memory. Twenty-five participants participated in experimental sessions on consecutive days. The first session involved a categorization task to encourage memory encoding.

Memory resources recover gradually over time: The effects of word frequency, presentation rate, and list composition on binding errors and mnemonic precision in source memory.

Normative word frequency has played a key role in the study of human memory, but there is little agreement as to the mechanism responsible for its effects. To determine whether word frequency affects binding probability or memory precision, we used a continuous reproduction task to examine working memory for spatial positions of words. In three experiments, after studying a list of five words, participants had to report the spatial location of one of them on a circle.

Pulmonary Function Tests May Better Predict Dyspnea-Severity in Patients with Subglottic Stenosis Compared to Clinician-Reported Stenosis.

Objective: Patients with subglottic stenosis (SGS) present with varied degree of breathing complaints. The dyspnea index (DI) is a 10-question patient-reported outcome measure designed to measure the severity of upper airway obstruction. We set out to determine whether pulmonary function tests or clinician-reported degree of stenosis best predicted DI scores.

Midazolam and Ketamine Produce Distinct Neural Changes in Memory, Pain, and Fear Networks during Pain.

Background: Despite the well-known clinical effects of midazolam and ketamine, including sedation and memory impairment, the neural mechanisms of these distinct drugs in humans are incompletely understood. The authors hypothesized that both drugs would decrease recollection memory, task-related brain activity, and long-range connectivity between components of the brain systems for memory encoding, pain processing, and fear learning.

Methods: In this randomized within-subject crossover study of 26 healthy adults, the authors used behavioral measures and functional magnetic resonance imaging to study these two anesthetics, at sedative doses, in an experimental memory paradigm using periodic pain.

Comparison of tracheal resection outcomes at a university hospital vs county hospital setting.

Objectives: To evaluate the role of hospital setting on outcomes in open airway surgery by comparing patients who underwent surgery (cricotracheal resection [CTR] or tracheal resection [TR]) at a publicly funded county hospital vs a private university hospital.

Methods: Retrospective chart review of patients undergoing CTR or TR at two institutions; a private university hospital and a publicly funded county hospital from September 2014 to September 2019. Length of intensive care unit (ICU) stay, total time to discharge, minor and major complications were the primary endpoints.

Association of Social Determinants of Health with Time to Diagnosis and Treatment Outcomes in Idiopathic Subglottic Stenosis.

Objectives: To examine whether social determinants of health (SDH) factors are associated with time to diagnosis, treatment selection, and time to recurrent surgical intervention in idiopathic subglottic stenosis (iSGS) patients.

Methods: Adult patients with diagnosed iSGS were recruited prospectively (2015-2017) via clinical providers as part of the North American Airway Collaborative (NoAAC) and via an online iSGS support community on Facebook. Patient-specific SDH factors included highest educational attainment (self-reported), median household income (matched from home zip code via U.

Effect of Vitamin B12 Injection on the Vocal Performance of Professional Singers: A Randomized, Double-blind, Placebo-Controlled, Crossover Trial.

Importance: One-third of singers and vocal professionals report experiencing a benefit from empirical vitamin B12 injections for improvement of mild singing-related symptoms (eg, reduced stamina, vocal fatigue, and effort). However, there is no objective evidence to support or refute these claims.

Objective: To assess the presence and magnitude of the effect of empirical vitamin B12 injection on the vocal performance of singers.

A Novel Approach to Vocal Fold Mucous Retention Cysts: Awake KTP Laser-Assisted Marsupialization.

Vocal fold mucous retention cysts are an important etiology of dysphonia and have classically been treated via microsurgical excision under general anesthesia. We present four cases that were treated with a novel technique of awake potassium-titanyl-phosphate laser-assisted marsupialization under local anesthesia. Reasons for in-office treatment included older age, medical comorbidities, and desire to avoid surgery/general anesthesia.

Familiarity acts as a reduction in objective complexity.

High-complexity stimuli are thought to place extra demands on working memory when processing and manipulating such stimuli; however, operational definitions of complexity are not well established, nor are the measures that would demonstrate such effects. Here, we argue that complexity is a relative quantity that is affected by preexisting experience. Experiment 1 compared cued-recall performance for Chinese and English speakers when the stimuli involved Chinese features that varied in the number of strokes or involved Ethiopic features unfamiliar to both groups.

Greater discrimination difficulty during perceptual learning leads to stronger and more distinct representations.

Despite the conventional wisdom that it is more difficult to find a target among similar distractors, this study demonstrates that this disadvantage is short-lived, and that high target-to-distractor (TD) similarity during visual search training can have beneficial effects for learning. Participants with no prior knowledge of Chinese performed 12 hour-long sessions over 4 weeks, where they had to find a briefly presented target character among a set of distractors. At the beginning of the experiment, high TD similarity hurt performance, but the effect reversed during the first session and remained positive throughout the remaining sessions.

Hospitalized Patients With New-Onset Vocal Fold Immobility Warrant Inpatient Injection Laryngoplasty.

Objectives: To evaluate the impact of early inpatient bedside injection laryngoplasty (IL) in hospitalized patients with iatrogenic unilateral vocal fold immobility (UVFI).

Study Design: Retrospective cohort study.

Methods: A retrospective review of hospitalized patients with iatrogenic UVFI undergoing IL between September 2013 and June 2017 was performed.

Flexible versus rigid laryngoscopy: A randomized crossover study comparing patient experience.

Objectives: To compare flexible distal-chip laryngoscopy (FDL) versus rigid telescopic laryngoscopy (RTL) in regard to examinees' pain level, comfort, satisfaction, and preference, and to evaluate the clinician's assessment of the examinees' experience with both exam types.

Study Design: Randomized crossover study.

Methods: Twenty-three normal adult subjects were recruited to undergo both FDL and RTL; the initial exam type was randomized.

Comparative Treatment Outcomes for Patients With Idiopathic Subglottic Stenosis.

Importance: Surgical treatment comparisons in rare diseases are difficult secondary to the geographic distribution of patients. Fortunately, emerging technologies offer promise to reduce these barriers for research.

Objective: To prospectively compare the outcomes of the 3 most common surgical approaches for idiopathic subglottic stenosis (iSGS), a rare airway disease.

Frequency effects on memory: A resource-limited theory.

We present a review of frequency effects in memory, accompanied by a theory of memory, according to which the storage of new information in long-term memory (LTM) depletes a limited pool of working memory (WM) resources as an inverse function of item strength. We support the theory by showing that items with stronger representations in LTM (e.g.

Forgetting Is a Feature, Not a Bug: Intentionally Forgetting Some Things Helps Us Remember Others by Freeing Up Working Memory Resources.

In the present study, we used an item-method directed-forgetting paradigm to test whether instructions to forget or remember one item affect memory for subsequently studied items. In two experiments (s = 138 and 33, respectively), recall was higher when a word pair was preceded during study by a to-be-forgotten word pair. This effect was cumulative: Performance increased when more preceding study items were to be forgotten.

The rising rate of nonsmokers among laryngeal carcinoma patients: Are we facing a new disease?

Objectives/hypothesis: Laryngeal squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) is strongly associated with tobacco smoking. With the rising awareness of tobacco's adverse health effects, we have witnessed a global decrease in tobacco use. Nevertheless, laryngeal SCC remains prevalent and includes a subset of patients lacking the traditional risk factors.

Adverse Events after Rigid and Flexible Endoscopic Repair of Zenker's Diverticula: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.

Objective: To determine adverse events after endoscopic flexible vs endoscopic rigid cricopharyngeal myotomy for treatment of Zenker's diverticulum (ZD).

Data Sources: Systematic review of MEDLINE, Web of Science, CINAHL, Clinicaltrials.gov, and Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials for all years according to Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines.

Memory for non-painful auditory items is influenced by whether they are experienced in a context involving painful electrical stimulation.

In this study, we sought to examine the effect of experimentally induced somatic pain on memory. Subjects heard a series of words and made categorization decisions in two different conditions. One condition included painful shocks administered just after presentation of some of the words; the other condition involved no shocks.

Protocol for a Randomized Controlled Trial of CI Therapy for Rehabilitation of Upper Extremity Motor Deficit: The Bringing Rehabilitation to American Veterans Everywhere Project.

Constraint-induced movement therapy (CI therapy) has been shown to reduce disability for individuals with upper extremity (UE) hemiparesis following different neurologic injuries. This article describes the study design and methodological considerations of the Bringing Rehabilitation to American Veterans Everywhere (BRAVE) Project, a randomized controlled trial of CI therapy to improve the motor deficit of participants with chronic and subacute traumatic brain injury. Our CI therapy protocol comprises 4 major components: (1) intensive training of the more-affected UE for target of 3 hour/day for 10 consecutive weekdays, (2) a behavioral technique termed shaping during training, (3) a "transfer package," 0.

Speech and Communicative Participation in Patients With Facial Paralysis.

Importance: Problems with speech in patients with facial paralysis are frequently noted by both clinicians and the patients themselves, but limited research exists describing how facial paralysis affects verbal communication.

Objective: To assess the influence of facial paralysis on communicative participation.

Design, Setting, And Participants: A nationwide online survey of 160 adults with unilateral facial paralysis was conducted from March 1 to June 1, 2017.