Why Is There No Cure for Tinnitus?

There is no cure because research has been stalled for years by people who were more content and saw more profits in selling hearing aid and prescribing palliative care such as TRT or CBT (which are the exact same thing except TRT sells you overpriced, inefficient hearing aids as part of the therapy).

 

If that anecdote from the Regain trial participant is true, then it looks like there is some kind of cure, we just can't have it yet.

 

When tinnitus is seen as the public health crisis that it is, then there will be a cure.

 

I just don't think T has been taken seriously enough by the medical industry. Hell, look at how hearing loss is treated by those not affected...like it's our problem or we're faking it to some extent. I can't tell you how many times I've been accused of ignoring people, or selectively hearing what people say...NO, I can't FK'ing hear you, sorry! My own wife believes I can hear way better than I actually can for goodness sake!

 

I believe it's for a variety of reasons:

Tinnitus is seen as an ailment that affects quality of life or is a nuisance, not something that kills people, so urgency is lower.

It's a complicated disease with many causes, and complex structures, that are poorly understood. The science just isn't there yet. Something that may help one person may not help another. This is the most significant reason. It has neurological and physiological factors. It's hard to imagine a "one size fits all" cure such a complex illness. Down the road likely treatments or cures will be available for different types of tinnitus, but before that happens, scientists need to figure out exactly what causes each kind, thus the crux of the problem. The understanding doesn't exist yet.

This doesn't apply to PT, the majority of pulsatile tinnitus cases can be diagnosed, treated and cured. It is a separate and very different situation. They should never be lumped together. My PT was cured with surgery. My general tinnitus will likely never go away. They came at different times, and had vastly different causes.

There isn't a lot of financial incentive for the drug companies to pursue research, plus many war veterans are affected, meaning it would become a cost burden to governments as well.

etc. etc.

There will eventually be a way to treat it, but it still may not be for many decades, or maybe over a century.

 

Nonsense, it's the contrary. The US DoD spends over $1 billion a year on disability payments for tinnitus, so they have a very big incentive to find a cure or better treatments (so that there's no need to pay disability payments anymore).

 

That's a good argument. That's likely true. I guess it goes back to the science then, and it just not being quite there yet.

 

I also wanted to add to my previous post that part of the problem also is that tinnitus is a subjective disease, meaning it's not objectively measurable by someone other than the sufferer. Again, there are neurological, physiological, and psychological variables which make it very hard for scientists/researchers to develop a way to treat, understand the underlying malady.

 

Some seem to think tinnitus is a rare disease
https://rarediseases.org/rare-diseases/tinnitus/

 

Wow. And the first line of the first paragraph is "Tinnitus is a common condition..." Unbelievable

 

I completely disagree. The many millions suffering the world over, a drug would be a cash cow.

And the government is spending I think around $2 billion a year in tinnitus related disability payments to vets? It's in their best interest to cure this. Which is why they invest in research.

 

I am convinced that (besides pulsatile tinnitus) there are at least two types of tinnitus that have nothing to do with each other. And one of them has nothing at all to do with hearing loss or hidden hearing loss, but possibly with the anatomical irritation of nerves perceived as noise.
As long as one understands tinnitus as a uniform phenomenon, no progress will be made.
Tinnitus is comparable to headaches, and there are subtypes, too.

 

I think that the main reason there is no cure, is due to the fact that nobody has any idea of how to actually accomplish this. The other reason is that the majority of people have it mild, and/or habituate and aren't bothered by it, so there hasn't been much of an attempt by the medical experts and pharmaceutical industry to find a cure.

 

Definitely. Tinnitus is exceedingly common. Even more so than most people realize.

 

Yes this just broke my brain
Oh wait

 

Most of the medical research treats tinnitus as a static or a slowly changing condition. This is inline with most diseases that are static or evolve slowly. I think a new line of medical research should start to understand the variations of tinnitus. I think understanding is missing on many basic questions. For example in this survey many interesting variations are shown but we do not know why are there such variations.
https://www.tinnitustalk.com/forums/research-news.4/

1a) Do we understand why 65% of individuals have tinnitus that is reactive to sound while in 35% it is not?
1b) Do we understand why 60% of individuals have tinnitus that changes during the day while in 40% it does not?
1c) Do we understand why 45% of individuals have tinnitus that can be changed with head, neck, jaw movements while 55% cannot do that?
2) Do any of these two groups of people have the same disease or is it really different disease but with same symptoms?
3) Why is there so large good day (median=3) vs. bad day (median 7) variation? What could be learned if people would be monitored and good days could be predicted.

 

This!

Doctors only say "well ... if you have better days maybe it will fade away", but here we have people with fluctuating tinnitus for decades.

 

No-one may fully understand the reasons for this but we can accept it and try to do something about it which is possible with treatment. Reactive tinnitus is actually Hyperacusis. This can improve by itself over time or by having specialist treatment that involves wearing white noise generators, to desensitise the auditory system so it becomes less sensitive to sound. Counselling with a tinnitus specialist is also required. This kind of treatment is not a quick fix and can take up to 2 years to reduce sensitivity or cure it.

This is the nature of the condition. Tinnitus comes in many forms and no two people will experience tinnitus the same, even when it fluctuates as you describe.

As previously mentioned tinnitus comes in many forms and no two people experience it the same.

It is the same condition but can affect people very differently. It comes in various forms of intensity: Mild, moderate and severe.

Once a person accepts the tinnitus life often becomes easier and less problematic. This takes time to acquire. Worrying over it and monitoring every little change in its perception is often very frustrating for people new to tinnitus. With time a lot of people find this condition slowly recedes into the background and habituation occurs. Each person is different and sometimes specialist treatment is needed to achieve this.

Michael

 

Not really as a tinnitus entity. Some triggers are known and some triggers happen for just about everyone. Tinnitus has many anatomy and physiology associations.

​

Yes. Tinnitus will resolved in 100% if a twisted nerve between C5 and C6 is fixed, not so for many other problems. There are so many diseases and conditions that associate to tinnitus. Tinnitus can have association to 97% of biology from the waist up and the higher the biology gone wrong often more so.

It's different diseases with one same symptom - something gone wrong where the brain isn't happy.
If a dish is dropped it might break, but never the same way twice as there's too many variables. We are basically dishes made of the same stuff.
Taking about tinnitus is as complicated as a discussion of the universe or even politics, or most anything else. Tinnitus has many variables, but the brain says so what, I'm not picky.

 

Considering the effectiveness of inhibitory drugs such as clonazepam, why are we not studying selective inhibition of neurons/brain centers (e.g dorsal cochlear nucleus)?

 

Can you post a reference to the c5/C6 quote? I have a bulging disc at that level and the annoying tinnitus tone is definitely left-central.

 

Tinnitus is common in mild and moderate forms. But I never met a severe patient in "real life". Just me. I don't think this level of ringing is common.

 

How do you define your severity Don? Mine is quite severe at moments, high hissing since 20 years which varies on a scale from 7-9 /10 as I can hear it in very loud environments but in some rare cases it drops to 3-4. And several tones I can only hear in silent places and at night or when wearing ear plugs.

I'm almost sure stress is the major culprit for me, while everything started to finally become better, I had to face a terrible week with a lot of familial and work stress and now I have the chance to have yet another tinnitus, still low volume but definitely a new sound which starts to become a little too much to be honest for me. I know the formula to become better but can't apply it due to financial obligations (3 children) and living since 4 years with burnout and almost 0 time off, like living with constant stress all the time.

Coincidentally I also started to test some new kind of magnesium (MagEnhance mix of bisglycinate, taurate, threonate) and high doses of of Taurine + L-theanine right before the onset of my new tinnitus but not sure if it has to do with it. I had a terrible fleeting tinnitus right after I took this MagEnhance supplement so it definitely did something. The problem with self-experimentation is you are never sure if it's good or bad.

 

Hi! Your tinnitus seems similar to mine. I have moderate and severe days, it rarely changes during the day. It only changes during deep sleep patterns. The fluctuation pattern varies and it´s like 2 bad days - 1 moderate day. I can reach 4 "good days" but sadly it doesn´t happen frequently.

When it´s severe I can hear it over everything, except the shower. When it´s moderate I can mask it with some sounds or distractions, those days are nearly normal. Good days are often accompanied with more sound sensitivity (maybe mild hyperacusis), I don´t know why.

I read stress can affect blood flow, so I assume it can be a cause of tinnitus and hearing loss in your case.

 

Hi, Yes seems comparable to mine but in most cases a shower doesn't even cover my tinnitus, only very loud environments like concerts, what is strange is that in a few cases contrary to you I had mine drop a lot, I could easily hear the difference comparing to environment noise.

Maybe you're right on the blood flow, but I wonder if there isn't more to it then just blood flow, or maybe some situations do change blood flow to particular areas in the brain. Really strange, it's sad as I was really on the better hand right before the hectic week and the new supplements and now have to start it all over again. At least I know that stress is bad and that some supplements can make it worse or better.

 

Because we look to a machine for answers.

 

To be honest I find your comment a bit negative, and we've been reading comments like these so many times in the past. Here are some facts: The main cause of tinnitus is exposure to loud noise, which causes damage to hair cells in the inner ear. An American Biotech, Frequency Therapeutics, is working on a drug that stimulates the natural regeneration of the damaged hair cells. The drug is called FX-322 and currently an ambitious trial is being conducted on a large number of patients. This trial will finish September 20th. Frequency has made a deal with Japanese pharma giant Astellas for worldwide (outside the US) distribution of this drug. So I'd suggest to spread this positive message among people with tinnitus, instead of making them feel desperate and miserable. I know you don't mean it like that, but people with tinnitus need hope, and Frequency's efforts give hope.

 

That would make sense only if you believe that every disease is curable if we just throw enough money at it. I don't think medical science works that way. There are some problems that are just very hard or impossible to cure. And with tinnitus, it's not just that there's no cure, but there's as of yet not even a viable treatment (assuming Lenire doesn't work as advertised).

 

Avenue for Future Tinnitus Treatments
Tobias Kleinjung, Berthold Langguth

Key points

• Current challenges in the development of new treatments for tinnitus.
• Neuromodulation approaches for tinnitus treatment.
• New drug targets for tinnitus treatment.
• The importance of clinical tinnitus databases.
• Lack of funding in tinnitus research.

It's interesting that they write: "Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is helpful for reducing tinnitus annoyance and tinnitus handicap [...] " even though Langguth worked on the Cochrane review of CBT for tinnitus which concluded there's only some low to moderate certainty evidence that "CBT may reduce the negative impact that tinnitus can have on quality of life at the end of treatment".

They also wrote: "A further difficulty is that perceptual aspects of tinnitus (eg, loudness) do not explain the subjectively perceived severity of the symptom." which I find quite frustrating because while there might be two people with the same tinnitus and different levels of distress, the distressed person could probably cope better if a treatment was able to reduce the loudness.
But TinnitusTalk got mentioned! "the results of a patient survey from tinnitus talk, with more than 5000 participants, provided the first empirical confirmation that there exist different tinnitus subtypes that vary in their response to different therapeutic interventions."

 

BSHAA webinar video - Why is there no cure for tinnitus (with captions)
- David Baguley, University of Nottingham