Betaserc (Betahistine)

Yes, I have heard of that as well... Still IT is not for treating tinnitus that was noise induced... But you are right I did not feel any ear pressure while I was on IT... Maybe I should start taking IT again... BC I have been experiencing ear pressure lately a lot....Hm... When will anyone finally find something for treating inner ear????? OMG

 

My sister in law was helped by betaserc and it was quite quickly too. Her T didn’t go away but she said it helped reduce it a lot. She got T after major surgery and some bad complications. I think maybe ototoxicity from all the antibiotics she would have had to take and the panic attacks and anxiety it caused.

I have taken it a couple of times now, once when I developed severe vertigo from an mri and it works for that amazingly, but no effect on my T. Pretty harsh on the stomach but they were 24mg tablets.

 

Why didn't you take a stomach protector?

 

Such as?

 

I take Pantoprazol but there are others.

 

I was prescribed twice, once when my right ear started, and again one month later when my left started.
The first time, I used 2 doses per day, for 2 weeks. Now I am prescribed 4 doses per day, and it's been 1.5 months.
Used it, and still will be using it for 2 more weeks. I don't think it has an effect on anything much.
The T in my left, which I think was due to stress and sudden high blood pressure has lessened - but I don't know whether it was time doing its job or the medication. I'm also using medication for blood pressure. The one in my right, which was sound induced is the same as the first day.
There is sometimes this weird ear pressure, but it usually goes away in a day or two, so nothing to worry about I guess.

 

I have been on Betahistine before. It worked wonders for my dizziness/off balance spells. Thay would completely clear up after a day as long as I kept taking it. I felt I had a spike in the volume of my tinnitus though. So, I stopped taking it. But, maybe that was a coincidence. Didn't feel like taking chances.

 

It made me feel hyped up. I stopped taking it a year ago as didn't do anything. Feel better off it. It doesn't do anything for tinnitus and is a limited drug in its efficacy for other issues associated with ears. Unfortunately it's the only drug out there.

 

I tried betahistine for a few months, didn't have any effect on the tinnitus. Did not hurt also.

Betahistine makes the bloodflow better inside your ear. If you have blood flow issues it might work.
They prescribe it for vestibular migraine, Méniere, etc.

 

Doesn't help at all in my case for the tonal tinnitus, but has helped quite a bit for the pulsatile tinnitus.

 

Hi, So I saw my ENT today and he told me that he wants to try putting me on a super high dose of Betahistine, the normal dose is 48mg a day and he wants to put me on 144 mg a day. I was just wondering if anyone else has had experience with doses this high and what side effects I should expect? He wants me to do this for one month and then slowly reduce my dose.

 

Did you tried it?

 

Try a normal dose of 48 mg. You can experience side effects from the normal dose as well. Some of them are skin rashes, upset stomach, eye irritation, inability to fall asleep, insomnia. If you have ear pressure issues it works. I have ear pressure issues that cause me fluctuating hearing and fluctuating hearing loss and it worked well, it gave me mild stomach irritation but also inability to fall asleep and severe eye irritation. I stopped it and my hearing gets worse ( mind you most of the time I'm in my house and I'm occupied with quiet stuff), eating a really balanced diet (no sodium, no sugar).

 

Deborah Hall and al. are going to conduct a systematic review about betahistine for tinnitus. See protocol below:
https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD013093/full

 

Remember that there is a difference in off label betahistine and Betaserc (from Mylan). My ENT said to absolutely avoid the standard Betahistine 16mg and only take Betaserc 24mg. My menieres alike attacks have diminished from 1-2 a week to 1 or 2 per half year and my hearing went from -60 to -30db. So still some hearing loss but not as extremely bad as it was. I even couldn't hear my alarm clock.

Sad thing is that if your hearing is a bit stable they tell you to taper off the betaserc while the cause (and the attacks) are not completely gone yet.

 

So is it possible that Betaserc 8mg that my ENT has given me might even make the Tinnitus worse?

Really? I asked him could it make it worse, and he said he has never heard that happen.

 

I used betaserc twice, first a few days after the onset, then 5 week in, when I had a permanent spike (perhaps due to extreme stress/high blood pressure). I don't think it had an effect on my tinnitus either way. Maybe it had some repairing effect on the inner ear, but who knows. I wouldn't be hesitant in trying.

 

I tried betahistine and trimetazidine and did not get any results.

 

Betaserc only seems to work in the higher doses and only if you have an hydrops. For BPPV it seems to do nothing.

 

Hello,

Today my friend and I have started Betaserc 48 mg a day. It's manufactured in France by Abbott.
I will report back with any developments regarding this medication. We will be taking in for 4 months 24 mg in the morning and 24 mg in the evening.

We both have developed tinnitus about 2 months ago. We both have unilateral tinnitus, although we think recently we both started hearing it on the other side.

Her cause is unknown, she just woke up with it one day after sleeping in the car on camping trip. Doctors think it's vascular and she's been trying different treatments focused on her neck without any improvements.

Mine is unknown too, it maybe from very bad blood flow in my neck/hereditary/from strict diet/recent course of antibiotics/headphones/music in cars. It has definitely has been aggravated by noise exposure from MRI.

 

If it lowers an hour after Betaserc intake it might also be a hydrops. Is there any nausea and or dizziness?

 

Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews
Betahistine for tinnitus

Abstract
Background
Tinnitus is a symptom defined as the perception of sound in the absence of an external source. In England alone there are an estimated ¾ million general practice consultations every year where the primary complaint is tinnitus, equating to a major burden on healthcare services. Clinical management strategies include education and advice, relaxation therapy, tinnitus retraining therapy, cognitive behavioural therapy, sound enrichment using ear‐level sound generators or hearing aids, and drug therapies to manage co‐morbid symptoms such as sleep difficulties, anxiety or depression. As yet, no drug has been approved for tinnitus by a regulatory body. Nonetheless, over 100,000 prescriptions for betahistine are being filled every month in England, and nearly 10% of general practitioners prescribe betahistine for tinnitus.

Objectives
To assess the effects of betahistine in patients with subjective idiopathic tinnitus.

Search methods
The Cochrane ENT Information Specialist searched the Cochrane ENT Register; Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL, via the Cochrane Register of Studies); Ovid MEDLINE; Ovid Embase; Web of Science; ClinicalTrials.gov; ICTRP and additional sources for published and unpublished trials. The date of the search was 23 July 2018.

Selection criteria
Randomised controlled trials (RCTs) recruiting patients of any age with acute or chronic subjective idiopathic tinnitus were included. We included studies where the intervention involved betahistine and this was compared to placebo, no intervention or education and information. We included all courses of betahistine, regardless of dose regimens or formulations and for any duration of treatment.

Data collection and analysis
We used the standard methodological procedures expected by Cochrane. Our primary outcomes included tinnitus loudness and significant adverse effects (upper gastrointestinal discomfort). Our secondary outcomes included tinnitus symptom severity as measured by the global score on a multi‐item tinnitus questionnaire, depressive symptoms, symptoms of generalised anxiety, health‐related quality of life, other adverse effects (e.g. headache, drowsiness, allergic skin reactions (pruritis, rashes) and exacerbation of tinnitus) and tinnitus intrusiveness. We used GRADE to assess the quality of evidence for each outcome; this is indicated in italics.

Main results
This review included five studies (with a total of 303 to 305 participants) comparing the effects of betahistine with placebo in adults with subjective idiopathic tinnitus. Four studies were parallel‐group RCTs and one had a cross‐over design. The risk of bias was unclear in all of the included studies.

Due to heterogeneity in the outcomes measured and measurement methods used, very limited data pooling was possible. When we pooled the data from two studies for the primary outcome tinnitus loudness, the mean difference on a 0‐ to 10‐point visual analogue scale at one‐month follow‐up was not significant between betahistine and placebo (‐0.16, 95% confidence interval (CI) ‐1.01 to 0.70; 81 participants) (very low‐quality evidence). There were no reports of upper gastrointestinal discomfort (significant adverse effect) in any study.

As a secondary outcome, one study found no difference in the change in the Tinnitus Severity Index between betahistine and placebo (mean difference at 12 weeks 0.02, 95% CI ‐1.05 to 1.09; 50 participants) (moderate‐quality evidence). None of the studies reported the other secondary outcomes of changes in depressive symptoms or depression, anxiety symptoms or generalised anxiety, or health‐related quality of life as measured by a validated instrument, nor tinnitus intrusiveness.

Other adverse effects that were reported were not treatment‐related.

Authors' conclusions
There is an absence of evidence to suggest that betahistine has an effect on subjective idiopathic tinnitus when compared to placebo. The evidence suggests that betahistine is generally well tolerated with a similar risk of adverse effects to placebo treatments. The quality of evidence for the reported outcomes, using GRADE, ranged from moderate to very low.

If future research into the effectiveness of betahistine in patients with tinnitus is felt to be warranted, it should use rigorous methodology. Randomisation and blinding should be of the highest quality, given the subjective nature of tinnitus and the strong likelihood of a placebo response. The CONSORT statement should be used in the design and reporting of future studies. We also recommend the development of validated, patient‐centred outcome measures for research in the field of tinnitus.

Source: https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD013093.pub2/full

 

As for tinnitus I don't agree. It severely limits my tinnitus when I have a Meniere's attack.

 

I am on Betahistine 16mg three times a day for Meniere's Disease, and have been, on and off for the last year: initially it was for 3 months, but as my symptoms continued, I was told to keep taking them. Fortunately I experience no side effects, but on the other hand, have not noticed any positive benefits of taking them, so am considering giving up on them.
The only thing that did help, in terms of reducing the frequency, severity and duration of dizzy turns, was having steroid injections via the tympanic membrane (ear-drum) - I had 3 of these at intervals spanning 4 months: they had no effect on the tinnitus, which is off the Richter scale, and my hearing is continuing to deteriorate quite rapidly.

 

Anyone knows a good online source for betahistin? i live in germany

 

It doesn't do shit, don't bother.

 

I got prescription for betaserc today.

As my ENT said, I really have nothing to lose if I try it. I was earlier on prednisolon and I feel it helped my symptoms a bit.

So, let's see how this goes.

 

It helps some people. Betaserc is cheap so you don't really lose much trying it.

 

Did the injections contain dexamethasone? Did it improve the aural fullness / stuffyness of your ear? Did it improve the dizzy spells?

 

Look for Betaver