Voice Disorders in Islamic Religious Officials: Is It Any Different Than Those of the Teachers, Another Well-Known Professional Voice Users?

OBJECTIVES: This study explores Islamic religious officials' voice use, disorders, and treatment methods by comparing the officials with teachers, the largest group of voice professionals.

STUDY DESIGN: This is a nonrandomized retrospective study.

METHODS: This study included 85 patients with voice disorder complaints; 42 were religious officials and 43 were teachers. We compared the two groups of patients in terms of demographic information, job descriptions, years in their professions, smoking histories, alcohol consumption, allergies and other systemic disorders, average weekly vocal loads, voice training, vocal abuse-misuse, reflux symptom index and voice handicap index scores, and voice disorder diagnosis and treatment methods.

RESULTS: The study compared 39 male (92.85%) and three female (7.14%) religious officials with five male (11.62%) and 38 female (88.37%) teachers. The alcohol use, systemic diseases, and vocal loads were found to be statistically higher in the teachers than the religious officials (P < 0.05), while the vocal abuse-misuse, vocal hygiene knowledge, and voice handicap indices were determined to be statistically higher in the religious officials than the teachers (P < 0.05). A statistically significant difference in the distribution of the diagnoses exists between the two groups (P < 0.005). Voice therapy is the most common treatment method in both groups.

CONCLUSIONS: Like teachers, Islamic religious officials appear to be at high risk of developing voice disorders. Because of the lack of research on the frequency of voice disorders among Islamic religious officials, it is important to raise awareness of the prevalence of voice disorders.