In my last post, I had a chronic case of voice strain which had thus far resisted the efforts of an ENT, a speech therapist, a physical therapist and a massage therapist. I also had a little voice whispering in the back of my head.
That little voice was saying…. “Asmanex… Look up Asmanex… Google it… Right now… Asmanex and vocal chords… do it do it do it!!”
All right, the little voice wasn’t whispering, it was shouting. I decided I’d better listen, because (1) my little voice is usually right, and (2) it’s not usually so insistent. I went to my office, Googled Asmanex and vocal chords and that’s when I found this: “Dry powder inhalers can accumulate on the vocal chords and cause hoarseness.” (FYI, Asmanex is an inhaled powder steroid for asthma prevention.)
Damn. Did I tell you that my little voice knows what it’s talking about?
Needless to say, I stopped taking it then and there. Of course, I was on Asmanex for a reason. I have asthma. In fact, I’d been on it for a little over a year, and it worked great! Only no one ever mentioned this little side effect. Nor did anyone mention it as a possible problem causer for me. Not the ENT, not the speech therapist, no one. Oh well.
So now that I had decided to stop taking the Asmanex, I thought, perhaps I should talk to someone. About the fact that I had stopped taking my medicine. You know, just in case I relapsed.
My physical therapist gave me the name of her allergist. I went to see him. He told me that steroids, especially the dry powder forms, can cause dysphonia (what the heck is that? it sounds awful!) and that over time, steroids in general can cause weakness in muscles. Namely, the muscles in my larynx. Namely, my vocal chords. Yikes!
Within three days of stopping the Asmanex, my vocal chords started to sound more like their old selves! They were still weak, just like the rest of me after three months of not working out. (All that darned therapy!) but with time, I know my voice is finally on its way to a complete and final recovery.
Dealing with Voice Strain (again!) « Verdanta said,
May 23, 2011 at 7:40 pm
[...] and still I managed to mess up my voice again. (Read about my first time here, here and here.) I’m not sure what triggered it, but the ENT suspects it was allergies. Here’s the [...]