Voice Treatment Center

Whether you sing professionally or are just struggling with a voice injury or disorder, physicians at the GW Voice Treatment Center diagnose and treat a variety of voice altering disorders, including:

• Injuries or diseases that affect the voice
• Benign vocal cord lesions, cysts, warts or polyps
• Precancerous and cancerous changes to the vocal cord
• Laryngeal weakness or paralysis

While medication can help in some cases, other therapies include:

• Injections or implants to help the vocal cords close properly
• Surgery to change the shape of the larynx, or move the vocal cords
• Endoscopic or open procedures to remove cancers and reconstruct the larynx
• Microflap excision procedures to remove benign vocal cord lesions.

During these procedures, surgeons use a microscope to view the larynx, and use microsurgical instruments to make an incision on the vocal fold to create a small flap. They lift the flap of normal vocal cord lining tissue to expose the abnormal tissue. Lesions are removed and the flap is returned to its normal position.

These precise procedures are designed to allow patients to speak normally again. For patients with early stage vocal cord cancer, this treatment can spare them the long-term effects of radiation therapy, which can damage the voice.