Health Blurbs

Laryngitis is an inflammation of your voice box (larynx) caused by overuse, irritation or infection. Because your vocal cords become inflamed and irritated, it causes you a sore throat and voice distortions that sound hoarse, weak or sometimes lost.

Laryngitis is predominantly caused by a viral infection, and frequently occuring with an upper respiratory infection. If this is your case, you’ll likely experience more than just a sore throat and hoarse or weak voice. Your other symptoms may involve:

• fever
• fatigue
• wheezing
• dry cough
• runny nose
• throat tickling
• dry, scratchy throat
• swollen lymph nodes
• difficulty swallowing ~ with strep infection

Since laryngitis is almost exclusively caused by a virus, you may experience its lost voice potential when you’ve been infected by or have:

• mumps
• measles
• sinusitis
• echovirus
• bronchitis
• rhinovirus
• pneumonia
• coronavirus
• common cold
• influenza virus
• parainfluenza virus
• respiratory syncytial virus

Rarely, bacterial infection (diphtheria, strep) or fungal infection are a cause for laryngitis symptoms, particularly if you have AIDS or another immune system issue.

Chronic laryngitis, meaning your hoarse or weak voice lasts over a month, is typically caused by some sort of throat irritation, such as:

• GERD
• chronic sinusitis
• excessive alcohol use
• voice overuse ~ singing, shouting, excessive talking
• inhaled irritants ~ chemical fumes, allergens, smoking

Laryngeal cancer and other health conditions inducing voice box paralysis, i.e. injury, stroke or lung tumor, may cause your voice to emerge as weak or lost.

If you let your sore throat laryngitis continue for too long, your voice box can permanently emit a hoarse voice.

Treatment for laryngitis depends on the cause. And virus caused laryngitis takes about a week or so for your weak voice to command its normal tone. You can help it along by:

• drinking plenty of fluids to prevent dehydration
• refraining from taking decongestants because they dry your throat
• not whispering because it strains your voice more than normal speech
• sucking lozenges, gargle with salt water, chew gum to ease throat irritation
• breathing moist air to soothe sore throat ~ humidifier, hot shower, inhale steam from boiling water
• resting your voice because helps reduce voice box inflammation ~no singing, shouting, yelling, unnecessary talking

Because most cases of laryngitis are caused by a virus, antibiotics are not beneficial.

Laryngitis occurring in children can lead to croup or epiglottitis.

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