Neuroinflammation Mediates Noise-Induced Synaptic Imbalance and Tinnitus in Rodent Models

The FDA has already released certain medications for fast track eligibility, such as gels to treat acute tinnitus and the like. If a promising tinnitus treatment surfaces, it’s likely that it will be fast track’d if the adverse effects are not severe.

 

Unfortunately mine is not intermittent but I do think some of the theories about the brain maintaining it don’t add up.

 

Genetic knockout of tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α) or pharmacologically blocking TNF-α expression prevented neuroinflammation and ameliorated the behavioral phenotype associated with tinnitus in mice with NIHL.​

From my understanding, TNF-α blockers are already on the market. Do people who use them have reduced tinnitus? Or am I missing something?

 

Taken from Wikipedia.

TNF or its effects are inhibited by several natural compounds, including curcumin (a compound present in turmeric), and catechins (in green tea). Cannabis and Echinacea purpurea also seem to have anti-inflammatory properties through inhibition of TNF-α production, although this effect may be mediated through cannabinoid CB1 or CB2 receptor-independent effects.

I can only speak for myself. But I feel that curcumin sometimes has helped me with my tinnitus. And on a few occasions lowered it a little. The plot thickens.

 

Saw this earlier today on Facebook, interesting. Seems neuro-inflammation can come from different sources (stress, food, even noise at it seems, ... ) so maybe this can explain why some think it comes from noise and others from stress, food, ... ?

 

Also from Examine.com:

One of curcumin's most well-researched effects on inflammation is inhibiting TNF-a induced activation and nuclear translocation of NF-kB, a protein that influences the genetic code to produce inflammatory cytokines. This has been seen in immune cells after oral ingestion of 150mg curcumin (resveratrol at 75mg, green tea catechins at 150mg, and soy at 125mg as confounders) but also in isolation in vitro and in vivo.

I already take resveratrol. Might as well add a quality curcumin supplement along with a green tea capsule and give it a go.

 

Allegra and Prilosec have Potent TNF inhibiting action. Has anyone experienced relief while taking either of these?

 

It's interesting because @JohnAdams felt relief when he took Curcumin... isn't Curcuming TNF inhibiting?

 

I am testing a curcumin-containing thing now but it has no effect.

 

What is the thing and how much are you taking?

 

It is called Gurkemeie Max tablets with a daily dose of 200mg curcumin. Have tried them for two weeks.

 

I found the therapeutic dose to be at least 3 grams, taken with some kind of animal fat. That's 15x what you're taking.

 

What product is that and where is it for sale? 3 grams will be 30 tablets of Gurkemeie Max that I`m taking now...

 

Does curcumin even cross the blood-brain barrier?

 

The cochlea and auditory nerve are not behind the blood brain barrier. Cochlear fluid is separated from the systemic blood flow by the blood labyrinth barrier. And can curcumin cross that? I'm pretty sure it can.

 

I always take the Jarrow brand, 500 mg capsules.

 

Ok, I will give it a try.

 

I've been taking 3 grams of curcumin daily for the last several weeks. It is significant to note I have also noticed that my tinnitus has changed as well. It does not appear to be quite as loud on my "bad" days. Also, it is quieter on my "good days". The number of quiet days has also increased. It's really the only thing I've done differently that I can think of that may have had an impact.

 

It also has anti-cancer, otoprotective, and anti-stress properties.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2758121/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24841915
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17022948

Do you like pizza?
If so, do you ever dip your crust in ranch sauce like this?

 

Very interesting. A friend of mine who loves Indian food told me of a friend of his that uses it to treat wounds with success. Mother nature provides a significant amount of medicine that is overlooked by western society in favor of pharmaceuticals. Also, I've noticed the more annoying of the 2 tones I have has kind of taken a backseat as if late since I started the curcumin. I'm going to start my father on a regimen of curcumin as he was recently diagnosed with bladder cancer. I really appreciate the info.

Oh, I'm from upstate NY so I definitely like pizza. We have some of the best in the world. The sauce looks good too. Is there curcumin in it?

 

That's what I was going to tell you. Break the curcumin pills up into the ranch sauce and mix it up. It's very tasty.

 

Curcumin does cross the blood-brain barrier, but penetration is poor. There are several studies into curcumin and its anti-amyloid properties for Alzheimer's where availability in the brain is key. Researchers at UCLA (?) came up with a lipid-curcumin formulation patented as Longvida that supposedly improves blood-brain barrier penetration because of this research. It's patented by a company called Vendure Sciences, but is licensed out to several manufacturers for production. You can even buy it on Amazon. If this new tinnitus study is saying neuroinflammation in the auditory cortex is a root cause of tinnitus, then we would also want to maximize blood-brain barrier penetration. I'm taking curcumin now and slowly increasing my dose but may try this form soon.

Curcumin does inhibit secretion of TNF-alpha (what was inhibited in this study to prevent tinnitus) but it also has the same effect on several other pro-inflammatory mediators. Since the central nervous system's (CNS) immune response cells (microglia) are only located in the CNS, getting the curcumin to those cells seems like it may improve the antiflammatory effect on the auditory cortex.

Microglial cells also happen to be sensitive to potassium channels, which I believe is part of what Thanos Tzounopoulos is working on.

Vendure Sciences Longvida
Use of curcumin in diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of Alzheimer's disease
Anti-neuroinflammatory effect of curcumin on Pam3CSK4-stimulated microglial cells

 

Thank you for such an informative post, I just ordered some longvida curcumin from Amazon, I will see if it has any effects.

 

Anti-TNF are already on the market for other diseases such as Crohn's disease. So it would not need years, just real proof that it works.

But I think this is for new tinnitus, just like corticosteroids. If not, then corticosteroids would also work just like they also works with Crohn's disease?

And also I believe tinnitus starts with hearing problem but then it's all in the brain. For instance my tinnitus started after I listened if I had tinnitus, and then I started to hear one sound, then two, then three... and now it's absolutely shit, without no acoustic shock in my ear.

 

I think Dr. Bao mentioned that side effects would have to be thoroughly investigated before any human trials. I'd be hopeful if that means that the trials would be shorter, or less of them.

 

This is pretty fascinating, but I am wary of the class of drug used. The function of TNFa is cancer suppression, and while there's no bug smoking gun there's worrying little data on the long term use of TNF inhibitors.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3241884/

It can take a decade of widespread use of something before you see even a very strong and fairly rapid correlation with cancer, so there's an unknown risk here.

 

So, for the last three days I upped the dose of curcumin to 700 mg and it really reduces my tinnitus by more than half. The tension in my neck is also a lot reduced. It seems the formula I am using has 5 mg Piperine added which should help curcumin uptake: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5664031/.
It also has 10 mg Ginger extract per pill.
My doses now are 700 mg curcumin, 35 mg Piperine, 70 mg Ginger extract.

 

How much curcumin and what brand?

 

They are locally made and many times as expensive as other ones in the doses that I seem to need. https://gurkemeiemax.no/?ref=adw-se...MI2KS066WW4wIV0eWaCh3mQQSfEAAYASAAEgKH2fD_BwE So I want to find some other alternative. But not sure if the Jacobs brand that iherb.com sells has Piperine in them..

 

Thank you!