The purpose of this clinical trial is to understand how viewing educational health modules impacts vocal health behaviors in mask-wearing healthcare workers.
Results of the investigators' previous work showed that mask-wearing healthcare workers have difficulty with voice and communication. Healthcare workers reported significant increases in vocal effort and dyspnea while wearing masks, and showed greater effort and poorer vocal quality at the end of the workday compared to the beginning of the day. Despite these negative changes, very few healthcare workers reported using any type of communication strategy (e.g., taking breaks, using gestures). Therefore, the investigators developed educational modules to address the voice and communication problems facing this population. This clinical trial plans to evaluate how these educational modules impact subjective/objective voice and communication measures in mask-wearing healthcare workers.
Study Type
INTERVENTIONAL
Allocation
NA
Purpose
PREVENTION
Masking
NONE
Enrollment
5
We have developed four educational health modules (total duration of approximately 30 minutes). First, these modules explain how masks impact communication and voice, then they describe health strategies to improve communication and voice, and finally, they give real-life examples of how the strategies can be implemented into the work setting.
Victoria McKenna
Cincinnati, Ohio, United States
Change in amount of Vocal Effort after 1 week
A self-perceptual rating of voice exertion and how hard it is to make a voice. The vocal effort scale will be rated on a 100-mm visual analog scale in which the left side (score of 0) indicates "no effort" to produce a voice, and the right side (score of 100) indicates "the most effort" to create a voice.
Time frame: Assessed prior to module viewing and again 1-week later
Learning of Health Information
Answer questions about the content of the module (short answer, multiple choice, true/false)
Time frame: Assessed immediately after viewing the modules
Change in Relative fundamental frequency
An acoustic measure that characterizes change in fundamental frequency during voicing transitions. Participants will complete vowel-voiceless consonant-vowel combinations (e.g., /ifi/) and relative fundamental frequency will be determined.
Time frame: Assessed prior to viewing modules, and then 1-week later
Module Information Retention
Answer question about the content of the modules (short answer, multiple choice, true/false)
Time frame: Assessed at second session
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