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Articles
An Open Letter sent to 14,300 Ear, Nose and Throat Doctors
Morton Cooper, Ph.D. 11661 San Vicente Blvd. #301 Los Angeles, CA 90049 (310) 208-6047
Dear Colleague:
As you may be aware, I have demonstrated for many years that my exclusive non-invasive technique called Direct Voice Rehabilitation (DVR) can achieve dramatic results with spasmodic dysphonia (SD). This includes not only improvement or recovery but also cures. I’m writing to bring these results to your attention in the hope that you may find this information useful in your own practice as an alternative to invasive approaches. Current medical treatment for spasmodic dysphonia focuses on two invasive options: Botox injections or surgery. The research literature has reported mixed results with surgery, and concerns about long-term use of Botox are increasing. Mitchell S. Brin, M.D., one of the pioneers in the use of Botox for SD, suggested at a conference on SD in March 1991 that this treatment should be withdrawn at the earliest possible time in favor of another substance. Serious negative side effects following the use of Botox have been reported by patients. Gerald Berke, M.D., chairman of the UCLA Head and Neck Division, commented in the December 1999 newsletter of the National Spasmodic Dysphonia Association that there are a number of “obvious drawbacks” to Botox: “It requires lifelong visits from 4 to 10 times per year for repeat injections. The injections are not inexpensive. The interval between post injection breathiness, good voice, and the return of symptoms may not be very long in some patients. Hypersensitivity and antibody formation have been shown to produce some long term structural changes in muscle cells.”
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The Strangled Voice By Morton Cooper, Ph.D
Reprint from "Let's Live", Jan '80
His voice came out "strangled." "I can barely talk," Bill says of his voice. "It began right after I yelled at a baseball game. I was hoarse and I noticed my voice just wasn't coming out right anymore. I had to push and force my voice out in order to talk. Then it got harder and harder to get the sound out and I pushed more until I was out of sound. My face and my neck tightened up and my body was very tense. Still the voice wasn't coming out right. It sounded like I was strangling myself when I talked."
Years ago, in 1871, a German scholar, Ludwick Traube, described the "strangled voice" and in 1875 Viennese laryngologist J. Schnitzler, M.D., named the condition Spastic Dysphonia. Spastic dysphonia describes a voice that has abrupt, uncontrolled changes in pitch, skips and breaks in the voice, temporary loss of voice during speech, and tone change from a clear sound to a choked, hoarse, and croaked sound.
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Recovery from Spastic Dysphonia By Direct Voice Rehabilitation
by Morton Cooper, Ph.D 1980
The etiology of spastic dysphonia remains in dispute. Some writers propose a psychological causation; others favor a neurological or physiological disturbance. Dedo, Townsend, and Izdebski (1978, p. 879) state: "A possible hypothesis for an organic cause would include physical trauma or a viral infection in the peripheral or the central nervous system as a cause of selective disturbances in conduction and control of neural impulses from or to the larynx." However, medical examinations of my patients have not substantiated a neurological basis for spastic dysphonia. I agree with Weiss (1971, p. 81) who states: "Spastic dysphonia is an extreme reaction of the patient to his anxiety centered around his vocal function." I would add that the patient often reveals a voice neurosis rather than merely anxiety.
My clinical experience indicates that spastic dysphonia is functional in origin and may develop in three ways: (1) gradually and insidiously (period of years) due to long-term voice misuse and abuse; (2) quickly (period of months) due to voice misuse and abuse, to psychological trauma, or to physical trauma; or (3) suddenly from a traumatic incident. In the first two developmental types, spastic dysphonia may be preceded by incipient spastic dysphonia (a term I use to describe the earliest stage of spastic dysphonia), or it may appear as the entity known as spastic dysphonia. In this paper, only spastic dysphonia, and those patients diagnosed as having spastic dysphonia will be discussed. (It should be noted that a number of patients seen with spastic dysphonia report they had voice fatigue, nodules, polyps, or contact ulcer, prior to the spasticity.)
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From Issue 6 of: "Advance for Speech Language Pathologists & Audiologists"
Feb. 1st, 1993 - By Morton Cooper, PhD
Spasmodic dysphonia (SD) is considered to be a hopeless condition by the medical profession and by speech pathologists. The treatment of spasmodic dysphonia is to contain the symptoms, not to cure the problem.
The center of the disorder is the basal ganglia, according to current reports in the medical and speech pathology literature. I disagree markedly with this position, finding the cause is voice misuse and abuse, with psychological overtones. Over the past 20 years, I have been finding successes and cures with Direct Voice Rehabilitation (DVR).
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Hmmm, Is There a Cure for Spasmodic Dysphonia?
BY JIM WALTZER
If you agree with Mort Cooper, Ph.D., by mouthing a reflexive "uh huh," you’re bound to receive a pat on the back for good vocal delivery.
"That's putting the voice in the lips and the nose where it belongs," says the Los Angeles-based speech-language pathologist and voice specialist. "You've got to get it out of the lower throat and into the 'mask'."
Few members of the medical community agree with Dr. Cooper, however, when it comes to diagnosing and treating spasmodic dysphonia, an involuntary movement of the vocal cords commonly referred to as "strangled voice."
Waging a decades-old battle for recognition and respectability, Dr. Cooper says the medical establishment continues to label SD a neurological problem, but that the condition is essentially a 'mechanical misuse of the speaking voice.' He maintains that his methods have restored speech for hundreds of people otherwise doomed to a lifetime of chronic hoarseness of speaking words at 45 rpm on a 33-rpm turntable.
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DR. MORTON COOPER REPORTS CURES OF SPASTIC & SPASMODIC DYSPHONIA BY A SIMPLE UNIQUE APPROACH
CALLED DIRECT VOICE REHABILITATION
Spastic and Spasmodic Dysphonia (SD): Current Treatment and Research
At the 1998 Pacific Voice conference I presented cures of Spastic and Spasmodic Dysphonia (SD) by Direct Voice Rehabilitation (DVR). I presented cures of people who had been diagnosed with the most severe Spastic Dysphonia by the UCLA Medical Center Head and Neck Division. The SD diagnoses were made by the Medical Center’s experienced physicians, including my colleague, Paul Ward, M.D. who was chairman of the Medical Center Head and Neck Division, preceding the present chairman, Gerald Berke, M.D., another colleague. Gerald diagnosed Gayle Pace as having Adductor/Abductor SD, and referred Ms. Pace to me. After my DVR program she was referred back to Gerald Berke who, according to Ms. Pace, confirmed her cured. Ms. Pace remains cured of SD fourteen years after treatment. Paul Ward diagnosed Marjorie Whitman with SD so severe that he recommended surgery. Ms. Whitman declined. She recovered a normal voice by my DVR program, and Paul confirmed that she had a normal voice; she had overcome spastic dysphonia. A famed M.D. outside of UCLA Medical Center diagnosed the Reverend Henry Sellers with SD and gave him a Botox shot; he lost his voice for six months. Gerald Berke saw the Reverend Sellers and referred him to me. The Reverend Sellers remains cured for years even though he now has Parkinson’s Disease. Gerald diagnosed Mr. Robin with SD, advising Botox. Mr. Robin opted for DVR and has been cured of SD for four years. The Rabbi Alan Green, diagnosed at UCLA with SD, has been cured for fifteen years by DVR; his cure was confirmed at UCLA.
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WHEN PARADIGMS FAIL
©Copyright December 27, 2000 [All Rights Reserved]
JOHN M. CURTIS
Los Angeles Daily Journal
(310) 204-8700
Since Traube's discovery of "the strangled voice" in 1871, the medical community hasn't offered a single cure in nearly 130 years, preferring to attribute spasmodic dysphonia to arcane neurological and psychiatric explanations. Early on in their medical training, physicians are told to show deference to Occam's razor by giving practical explanations without undue mystification.
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