Tinnitus - do you have ringing in the ears?

Having known a number of people to suffer this before myself I believed that the only thing that could be done was distraction therapy. I am still skeptical about the herbal drops but this girl was adament that her farthers case was quite severe and added that his tinnitus returned a few months after he stopped using the drops only for it to go again when he resumed treatment. I wonder why if this treatment works why is it not known of world wide.

I have a question regarding this this frequency cancellation treatment. If it works by cancelling the ringing by matching the frequency would'nt it be then removing that frequency from your audiable spectrum?

Rockethouse

That would be my guess as it is based on noise cancelation technology. But I am not a physician nor audiologist so I am not qualified to comment. There is much on the web concerning this subject and I can only regurgitate what information I have found. Maybe others will chime in with more knowledge and experience.

I do know that the this appears to be a fairly common ailment especially with the lesser severe cases, more of a nuisance than a major handicap. And that it seems there is not much research being done in the States to alleviate it or cure it.

Chuck

What Rockethouse is referring to is called masking. This technique involves wearing an earpiece that emits a sound
designed to replace or "mask" the tinnitus you normally hear. All you're doing is repacing one bothersome sound (tinnitus) with what is supposed to be a less bothersome sound. These masking sounds played into your head are loud enough only to mask the tinnitus, which is not that loud compared to outside sounds, unless you're unlucky enough to have tinnitus in the 50-70db range. Whether you can hear sounds in the frequency range of the tinnitus or masker gets back to whether or not you have hearing loss in those ranges to begin with. There is something called Tinnitus Retraining Therapy which is different than masking. It involves wearing earpieces all day in both ears regardless of which ear the tinnitus is in. The volume is set just below that of the tinnitus volume and gives your brain an alternative to place it's attention on. This training or
"retraining" of the brain can take a couple of years and
occurs along with therapy sessions to deal with the psychological affects of tinnitus. This therapy has helped a majority of those who complete the program. When successful the tinnitus sufferer is no longer bothered by
the tinnitus. In fact they only notice it if they "listen"
for it. At this point the brain no longer finds the tinnitus sound interesting or threatening.

I've done a bit more research and have come across some info indicating that tinnitus could be caused by certain kinds of head trauma. It got me thinking. In mid November my wife and I went to the Philadelphia Kimmel Center to hear some jazz. As I'm pretty sure I recollect, on the way home I did not have any ringing in my ears. Just a short time after than I slipped and hit my head on a closet door. I passed out for only a few seconds, and had no bump on the head (the door fortunately popped open when I hit it, relieving some of the force). At the start of the year and our next visit to the Kimmel, it was the first time I noticed ringing as we were on our way home. Is it possible this could be causing my problem?

Larrman

You seem pretty knowledgable about the subject are you an audiologist or ENT?

Chuck