Posted on 10/16/2015 9:16:24 AM PDT by Red Badger
People who have it say it can be excruciating. Tinnitus causes pain and a constant ringing in the ears that makes it almost impossible to concentrate or enjoy a social gathering.
Worst of all, there's little they can do about it. There are treatments that can help, but no cure.
Now, neuroscientists at Georgetown University Medical Center and colleagues in Germany say they've discovered the brain condition that causes it. It's not a cure, but researchers say it is the first step toward finding one.
Writing in Trends in Cognitive Sciences, the scientists describe how the brain mechanisms that normally control noise and pain signals can become dysfunctional, leading to a distorted perception of these sensations.
Like an electrical engineer, they were able to trace the flow of these signals through the brain to where “circuit breakers” should be working — but aren’t.
Brain injury
Josef Rauschecker, a member of the German research team, says a brain injury sometimes scrambles the sensory apparatus. He says tinnitus can occur after the ears are damaged by loud noise. After the brain reorganizes itself, it continues to “hear” a constant hum or drum.
Meanwhile, chronic pain can occur from an injury that often is healed on the outside but persists inside the brain.
“Some people call these phantom sensations, but they are real, produced by a brain that continues to ‘feel’ the initial injury because it cannot down-regulate the sensations enough,” Rauschecker said. “Both conditions are extraordinarily common, yet no treatment gets to the root of these disorders.” Key to a cure
The researchers believe the key to finding a cure for Tinnitus is repairing the brain's “circuit breakers,” restoring the brain's central gatekeeping system for control of perceptual sensations.
Doctors say people who have tinnitus may also complain of fatigue, stress, sleep problems, and anxiety.
You may be at higher risk of developing tinnitus if you are over 65 and male. Also, people exposed to loud noises for extended periods of time and those with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have higher rates of tinnitus.
Symptoms
How do you know that ringing in your ears is tinnitus? The symptoms have been described as hearing sounds when no sound is present. The ringing may not actually be ringing at all, but more of a buzzing, hissing, or squealing. They may be low or high frequency sounds and interfere with your ability to concentrate.
If you think you are suffering from tinnitus, you should tell your doctor. They may request a medical history, conduct an exam, or run a series of tests. For starters, a doctor will likely check the ear itself to make sure there isn't a build-up of wax or a foreign object lodged in your ear canal.
Tell your doctor whether the noise you hear is constant or comes and goes. Does its frequency change, or does it rise and fall? If you suspect that you have age-related hearing loss, inform your doctor, since the two conditions are often related.
The doctor may order an audiogram (hearing test), an auditory brain stem response (ABR), or even an MRI. The purpose is not only to locate the cause but to rule out the presence of tumors.
Magnesium helps only because he musta been bound up. When you are all bound up, the ringing gets really high pitched and loud. Once you are back to being regular, not so much ringing and a lower pitch.
This refusing to be a victim thing is so 20th Century.
Your experience mirrors mine. It gets interesting if you try to take a hearing test where those pesky tones come over the earphones. I hear the tones even when they aren’t there.
Both ears from two days on the rifle range, Fort Ord California early 1969.
Any hope for people with painful feet due to plantar fasciitis? Most podiatrists will prescribe arch supports when surgery is required.
I’m a retired musician. Why am I retired? Terrible Tinnitus! Can’t count on my ears. Don’t listen to music anymore, except for an occasional youtube. I used to do a lot of studio gigs. The ringing, squeal, clicking, tapping etc., is louder than people speak. It has made me into a recluse. I hate it!
I also have tinnitus ,in stereo, no doubt. Loud music, loud factories, loud jets for many years. Mine is a sound of about 11,600 hz and it is constant 24/7 and very loud. That combined with the underlying hearing loss make many social situations, such as crowded noisy restaurants, parties, and concerts unbearable to me. I also really dread children’s scream as it is painful and it ups the volume of tinnitus for hours. It’s ALL ok for me and I am not complaining, just sharing.. I think my poor wife suffers over it more than me. I just can’t hear what people are saying and often ask people to repeat or to speak louder. I think I can still hear fairly well, but the tinnitus is so loud that it drowns out the sound. I do very poorly on hearing test because I can not tell the tones from the tinnitus.
If there was a way to make it truly stop, then I am all ears!
Not painful to me either, just *very* annoying.
I have come to the point of having to watch peoples lips as they speak to figure out all the words.
It does make it hard to get to sleep some nights as well.
Strange the constant ringing didn’t start until I began having grand mal seizures at the age of 55.
Both my dads parents were deaf, so I just figured it was a genetic thing.
There may be some hope of relief. If not, I soldier on.
get magnesium oil and soak your feet in it
A Choir of crickets? More of a chirping sound then? or like the constant steady hum of cicadas? (I pulled off the road when travelling the us once, and tried to get some sleep, and the cicadas started up and it was impossible- had to keep driving on to find a quiet spot)
[[Interesting. Dr. Savage has said on air that magnesium helps in the treatment as well.]]
Nope- doesn’t- take it regularly- no difference-
Yes, it sounds like cicadas on steroids..............
I now have TINNITUS in my right ear. It's livable, but I dearly miss stereo, since I'm totally deaf in that ear now, and being a musician, it really sucks.
FMCDH(BITS)
Just to be clear on the situation with mag, mag binds to 13 different things, some of which do not absorb and are not effective for anything. Oxide being the worst culprit.
I don’t know if any form of mag is or isn’t effective against tinnitus but I can tell you it is VERY effective against a number of other issues.
Huh...what'd he say?
So what do you hear when you ask a liberal a question that stumps them?
Uhhhh, hmmmm, duh, whuhhh, that is to say.....I mean....whahhhhhhhhhhhhh!..........
I have tinnitus too and I have had it for so long that I might miss it if it was gone.
Look up Iodine deficiency.
I know I’ve not got an Iodine deficiency. We eat a lot of seafood here on the Gulf Coast..................
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