Pulsatile Tinnitus Due to Anxiety?

Hi all,

Ever since the pandemic started, I developed pretty bad anxiety. About a month in, I developed pulsatile tinnitus in my right ear. I can only hear it when I'm lying down on my right side, and it disappears after a while (a few minutes), or sometimes when I stand up or lie down (in those cases, it disappears after seconds and I also experience a feeling of head fullness for a few seconds as well). I also hear it in the morning when I wake up, but again, it goes away after a while. The noise is a whooshing sound, not a heart beat. How worried should I be about this? It doesn't really affect my everyday life, and I just don't want it to be anything serious. I know that ideally I should see a doctor, but with the pandemic spiking again, I'm pretty wary of going to a hospital.

Like I said, I'm pretty sure it's related to anxiety or from lying down a lot during quarantine, as I've never had this issue before. I do have a lot of neck tension due to both reasons, and I'm pretty sure I have mild TMJ because my jaw clicks when I open/close it.

Sorry for the long post, but any advice would be much appreciated! I'm 21 and in good health from what I know (blood pressure is normal, no preexisting health conditions) and my parents think I'm over-worrying about this.

 

Anxiety can't really cause PT, but it can exacerbate it, or make it more noticeable. You should have it evaluated. It's really dangerous to dismiss anything as anxiety without a proper evaluation, and you shouldn't mention anxiety to a doctor before you have it evaluated either, because then they will dismiss you too.

If You Have Pulsatile Tinnitus, Here's the First Thing You Need to Do to Get Answers and a Diagnosis

 

@bluesky887 At your age, anxiety usually does not have a direct cause connection to pulsatile tinnitus. It can if older - at 65 years of age. Sometimes a few years younger.

Anxiety caused me hypertension - a rise in blood pressure - where a had a sudden and brief hypertension crises. This caused an abdominal aortic aneurysm where blood flow increased to carotid arteries causing PT. This isn't a rare happening. I also have peripheral arterial disease (PAD) which primarily results from atherosclerosis that also directs higher blood flow to the carotid arteries. Along with that - I have heart disease - I'm a winner.

This may be what's going on for you .
https://www.anxietycentre.com/anxiety/symptoms/pulsing-in-the-ear.shtml

 

@tiniturtle I just had an appointment with a gp about this, and she's doing some blood tests in a few days. I know this probably won't find the cause, but hopefully it's the first step. I'll definitely try to push for a International radiologist referral though. Also, you mentioned that you had a DAVF - do you know if they usually show up in an MRA? or is a ct angiogram absolutely necessary?

@Greg Sacramento So sorry you had to go through all that and thank you for the article! It describes almost exactly my situation, especially since the my PT started when I was going through one of the most anxious times in my life

 

update: it randomly went away this afternoon? I heard that it can be a bad sign sometimes - what should I do at this point?

 

It does come and go. Don't stress about it, just make a plan to have it evaluated. You want to see a neuro interventional radiologist. To answer your question, an MRI and MRA can sometimes indicate or hint at the existence of a DAVF, but the only way to confirm it is with a cerebral angiogram.