Unilateral Vocal Cord Paralysis

For initial inquiries into this topic, a computerized PubMed search of Medline listings from 1966–2005 was performe in January, 2006, using key words “vocal”, “fold” or “cord,” “paralysis” or “paresis” or “immobility” or “movement impairment”, and “treatment.” The search was filtered to include only papers published in English, involving human subjects, and including abstracts. This process yielded 1,930 publications. The search was then further limited by excluding single case reports, papers on the incidence or etiology of vocal fold paralysis, review articles with no new patient data (except meta-analyses), duplicate or follow-up papers, and papers focusing on non-voice outcomes such as swallowing. The remaining papers were reviewed and graded for their level of evidence, and then categorized into the subheadings of this chapter to the extent possible. The bibliographies of the selected papers were reviewed to determine whether any additional studies had been missed in the search, and these were added.