Vocal Self-Perception of Home Office Workers During the COVID-19 Pandemic.
Larissa Thaís Donalonso Siqueira, Ana Paula Dos Santos, Rebeca Liaschi Floro Silva and 3 others
PMID 33250356WHAT IT FOUND
During the pandemic, workers who moved to home offices reported more vocal fatigue and neck, shoulder, and back pain than workers at usual workplaces.
Their symptoms also rose after switching home. Workers kept in person reported more laryngeal pain.
Key findings
01Home-office workers reported higher vocal fatigue than usual-workplace workers before and during the pandemic, with total mean scores of 18.57 and 19.86 versus 16.03 and 16.15.
02Home-office workers reported more frequent pain in the posterior neck, shoulders, upper back, lower back, temporal region, masseter, larynx, and anterior neck than control workers, except the submandibular region.
03Within the home-office group, tiredness and voice impairment, avoidance of voice use, and total vocal fatigue increased after the pandemic began, along with pain in the posterior neck, shoulders, upper back, temporal region, and masseter; the usual-workplace group showed only increased laryngeal pain.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The study asked people to recall symptoms before the pandemic after the pandemic had started, so memory may have biased answers. It relied on self-reported questionnaires and did not examine voice quality or the larynx, because face-to-face assessment was not possible. Workers were not randomised to home or usual work, and groups differed in age and job classification, so the study cannot show that home office work caused the symptoms. Office workers all had to wear masks, and there was no group of office workers without masks, so laryngeal pain cannot be separated from mask use. Participants were recruited through social networks and had to be free of known dysphonia or voice risk, so results may not apply to workers already having voice problems.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflicts of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that working from home causes vocal disorders. The study was a cross-sectional self-report survey without randomisation or objective voice assessment, and it only shows that home-office workers reported more vocal fatigue and pain.