|
Current Question:
Q.
I'm 14 and I have been experiencing "ringing" in my ears almost every
other day for about a year. Before that, I had only had the ringing noise
maybe once a month. The pitch ranges anywhere from high to low and usually
lasts 10-30 seconds. I don't swim or listen to loud music or anything of
that sort. Can you help me determine what this is and possible treatment?
I also have trouble hearing what people are saying. I went in for a
hearing check and it was fine. I can hear the pitches, but when people are
talking it sometimes sounds like they are mumbling.
A. First, ringing in your ears is NOT
normal. The fancy name for all sorts of phantom sounds like ringing,
buzzing, hissing, chirping, shrieking, roaring, clicking, humming,
sizzling, whooshing, rumbling, whistling, etc. sounds is tinnitus.
Tinnitus is often the first sign you have that there is something damaging
your ears. As you are aware, loud noise can cause tinnitus. So can hearing
loss. You brain apparently likes to make up for the lost sounds by
manufacturing its own sounds. Another common cause of tinnitus is
prescription drugs. It is not well known at all, but there are at least
400 different prescription drugs that cause tinnitus.
You haven't given me enough information to know what caused your tinnitus.
Perhaps you have been around a loud noise in the past--even one gunshot
can cause tinnitus. Have you taken any medications in the past year or so?
What happened to you just before you noticed the tinnitus the first
time--anything out of the ordinary? What are you doing/eating just before
you get the tinnitus now? You could be sensitive to things like Aspirin or
caffeine. Remember, caffeine is not only in coffee, but in cola sodas, in
chocolate, etc. Tinnitus can also be caused by stress or being over-tired.
Apart from finding the cause of your tinnitus and eliminate it if
possible, the best thing to do about tinnitus is completely and totally
ignore it. If you dwell on it or worry about it, it will just get louder
and more annoying. Put it out of your mind as much as you can. You can
also mask it with other sounds. Leave a radio or TV playing in the
background to give your ears something to listen to and often you'll not
even notice your tinnitus.
When you say you had your hearing checked, did you go to an audiologist?
They are the people with the training to properly assess your hearing.
You may hear the various tones fine. That is one test they do. However,
there is another important test they do. That is where they get you to
repeat back a special list of single syllable words that tests for your
ability to discriminate between similar sounding words.. Discrimination is
really how well you understand what you hear. If your hearing is normal
and your discrimination scores are less than 90% or so, you will miss some
words--you'll hear them but not understand them.
If you haven't been to an audiologist, I think you should go to one and
explain that you need a complete audiological assessment. I'd be
interested in hearing what your audiogram and discrimination testing
reveal.
If you have further questions, you can always email me at:
mailto:neil@hearinglosshelp.com
Past Questions:
Q. I have been diagnosed
with a sensorineural hearing loss. It has come on within a period of
several months, and seems progressive. How does one rule out auto-immune
inner ear disease in a case like this?
A. You don't say whether your hearing loss is in one ear or both. That
makes a big difference in determining what may have caused it. I won't go
into the causes that would only affect one ear at this time.
There are several conditions that can cause a hearing loss like you
describe in both ears. One is called Meniere's Disease. If you have a
full-blown case, you would have four symptoms:
* fluctuating hearing loss,
* tinnitus (ringing in your ears),
* vertigo (a sensation of the room spinning)
* a feeling of fullness in your ears.
Note that Meniere's disease normally only affects one ear at a time--but
may attack both at the same time. If it does, it is often associated with
Autoimmune Inner Ear Disease (AIED).
Another cause of hearing loss in both ears could be a reaction to ototoxic
drugs you may have taken. Some drugs such as the aminoglycoside
antibiotics can cause a hearing loss several months after you finish
taking them.
A hearing loss that comes on slowly over several months is too slow to be
a virus. So by the process of elimination, if none of the above are true,
then you might have Auto-immune Inner Ear Disease (AIED).
If you body shows no signs of any other autoimmune disease (such as
rheumatoid arthritis), and does not have any autoimmune antibodies, then
doctors may just classify your hearing loss as Idiopathic sensorineural
hearing loss--which just means they don't have a clue what caused it.
Not a lot is known about AIED yet so doctors don't have any standard
protocol for diagnosing and treating it. If you want to learn more about
AIED, what it is, how doctors currently diagnose and treat it, and what
you can expect from such treatment, read the article I wrote on AIED. Just
click on the link below to go to this page on my website at:
http://www.hearinglosshelp.com/AIED.htm.
Note: I am not a medical doctor. I do not diagnose or treat any medical
problems. I provide education and information so you can better understand
and cope with your hearing loss. Please visit your physician for medical
diagnoses and treatment.
Q.
I suffer from hearing loss and tinnitus, moreover my ear has a
perforation. Are these things that can be cured? What is the best way to
reduce ringing in my ear?
A. If your eardrum is perforated, yes,
many times that can be fixed/cured. You need to see an ear specialist (ENT
or Otologist) and get them to help you. They can repair the hole or graft
some skin over it.
My concern is why you have a hole in your eardrum in the first place.
Often this is caused by middle ear infections which puts pressure on the
ear drum until it ruptures and puss drains out. If you have chronic ear
infections, your ear doctor needs to get this cleared up or there is no
point in repairing the hole in your eardrum.
Tinnitus (ringing in your ears) commonly accompanies a sensorineural
(inner ear) hearing loss. There are a number of other things that cause
tinnitus or make our existing tinnitus worse. You can get tinnitus by
exposing your ears to loud sounds, or as a result of being under too much
stress or from getting too much caffeine in your system. Another common
cause of tinnitus is from taking any of the 340 plus prescription and
over-the-counter drugs known to cause tinnitus.
The obvious way to reduce or eliminate your tinnitus is to cut out the
things that might have caused it in the first place. The list above is a
good place to start. Just be aware that no matter what you cut out, you
may still have tinnitus.
What do you do in this case? First, you need to educate yourself about
tinnitus. In the process you will discover that tinnitus is nothing to be
afraid of. It is NOT a sign of an impending brain tumor or other drastic
damage to your body. It can be simply your brain's attempts to "hear"
sounds that your ears no longer hear--thus it turns up its internal volume
control until it finally hears something. We call this tinnitus.
Once you understand that tinnitus is nothing to worry about, you can work
on getting your brain to turn down its internal volume so your tinnitus
won't bother you any more.
The secret to this is to have no emotional reaction to your tinnitus. You
must not be upset by it, or be angry at it or frustrated by it. You want
to totally ignore your tinnitus. When you do this your brain will slowly
turn down the volume and it will hopefully fade into the background. This
is called becoming habituated to your tinnitus.
I have had tinnitus for several decades, but it seldom bothers me unless I
think about it (like now while I am writing this my tinnitus is screaming
at me). When I finish this reply and do other things, within a few minutes
it will begin to subside and fade away so I'm seldom conscious of it
(although it is always there day and night).
Since you "hear" tinnitus most often in a quiet room, one trick is to
surround yourself with some background sounds to give your brain something
"real" to listen to. This is especially important if your tinnitus makes
it difficult for you to fall asleep at night. Put some soothing music on
the stereo to mask your tinnitus while you fall asleep. Many people find
this works for them. Try it. You may be pleasantly surprised.
Ask
the Experts
|
