The immediate effect of vocal technique associated with virtual reality game in people with Parkinsons disease

Abstract

Introduction People with Parkinson’s Disease (PD) have difficult motor hearing calibration, which affects the monitoring of vocal production. Therefore, employing visual stimulus associated with vocal therapy may benefit the voice of this population. For this purpose, some techniques favour the competence of the glottis, such as pushing, which consists of movements of the arms with a simultaneous effort to phonation and, associated with virtual reality games, provide playful therapeutic intervention through the simulation of experiences that can foster glottal adjustments and generate changes in the voice.Objectives To determine the immediate effect of the technique of pushing with plosive sounds associated with the use of a virtual reality game in the voice of people with Parkinson's disease.Methodology The participants were 17 men and 14 women, mean age of 62.61 (± 11.24) years, meantime of diagnosis 6.93 years, distributed in stages I (32.5%), II (22.59%), III (45.16%) of Hoehn and Yahr. scale. The vocal evaluation pre and post pushing technique with plosive sounds associated with virtual reality game consisted of analysing vocal, acoustic parameters from the record of the issuance of the vowel /ε/. The parameters extracted were Jitter, Shimmer, corresponding to signs of disturbance of the sound source and Glottal-to Noise Excitation (GNE), corresponding to the energy of the glottis on the noise. The satisfaction questionnaire on the implementation of this technique associated with virtual reality was used.Results The values of disturbance of the sound wave decreased, and the glottal energy on the noise increased, respectively, Jitter (p = 0.0075); Shimmer (p = 0.0048); GNE (p = 0.0008). Regarding the satisfaction questionnaire, 74.20% of them felt very satisfied and 25.80%, satisfied.Conclusion The vocal technique associated with virtual reality game improved the acoustic parameters of the participants' voice and the majority felt great satisfaction with the intervention.