Frequency Therapeutics — Hearing Loss Regeneration

That is interesting. I am not able to see the slide very well. Could be my screen settings (resolution?).
I would expect after 30 days post injection of FX-322 one can expect change.
This question has been asked in this thread before. How long will it take before you notice improvement?
Is this process in the inner ear expected to be similar to wound healing? Like a cut in your finger, as an example? That takes weeks to close again (no more scab). It is cell division after all. Perhaps this is too simplistic.
We will know soon, I hope (-;

Yes. After posting this I realized 24 hours is much too soon. But 30 days? I also wondered why not wait a little longer. But that would make this a completely different trial. That will be the upcoming trial if I understand correct.

Do you mean laser eye surgery for far and near sightedness?
Glasses or laser eye surgery can return your far or near sightedness close to 20/20.
Hearing aids will not return your hearing to original, or even close to original. Also it is suggested it could improve tinnitus. Therefore I would expect much more interest.
For me personally I would be elated if it could improve not only my audiogram. But at the same time these blasted, hyperacusis, distortion and tinnitus.
I would be building my long planned listening room for my HiFi (-;

 

I will go out on a limb here with a personal opinion, almost every subject who acquired tinnitus from a peripheral lesion will see it reversed completely post cellular repair of the ear. Restoring the lost information will turn it off through the same mechanism it began.

 

I have read the news regarding FDA. Pres. Trump is trying to cut some regulations for drug approval. So we can expect product on market sooner?

 

Am I understanding correctly that Decibel Therapeutics is working on repairing synapses while Frequency is focused on hair cell regeneration?

 

That is what I understand and read.

I wonder if loss of synapses can be a reason for tinnitus.
If that is the case we could need both. Hair cell regeneration and "reconnecting" of the synapses on existing hair cells.
Also, it would not surprise me that loss of synapses can be a reason for distortion I hear.

 

Very optimistic, what about long term tinnitus

 

I would imagine so, I was glad to stumble upon this recently.

"A disturbing implication of their finding is that hearing can be damaged at decibel levels and exposure times that have traditionally been considered safe. Nonetheless, among researchers, the discovery has been a cause for optimism, because reconnecting nerve synapses is almost certain to be easier than regenerating functioning hair cells inside human ears. “This is the simplest sensory circuit that you could possibly have,” Liberman said. “It’s one sensory cell type and one neuronal cell type, and it’s possible to do local delivery through the eardrum.” He and others have successfully restored some damaged connections in lab animals, and he believes that far greater advances are to come. “In the past five years, there’s been an explosion of biotech companies getting serious about the inner ear for the first time,” he continued. “I think most people in the field would say it’s no longer a question of if we will be able to unlock enough of the secrets but merely a question of when.” "

Source
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2.../04/03/high-tech-hope-for-the-hard-of-hearing

 

Can you send source about this ? I have never read about Decibel.

 

There are a number of threads about Decibel: https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/decibel-therapeutics-just-received-52m-in-funding.11595/ and https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/interview-with-decibel-therapeutics-new-ceo.16515/. If you have questions about Decibel, one of those threads would be more appropriate.

 

Aaron going sick again, funny you

 

So with all these companies working on a potential solution, for those who know quite some about it, when can we expect something to be available on the market? Would this be in 2yrs, 5yrs, 10yrs, 25yrs? Really curious what would be considered realistic.

"I don't think there's something on the horizon, whether it's a technological device or a drug, that will provide an immediate cure."-Stefan Heller, professor of otolaryngology at Stanford University
http://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/18/technology-that-can-help-millions-with-hearing-loss.html

Really curious what others think. I really don't have any idea / expertise.

 

How about you reading at least the last pages instead of asking the same fucking annoying question? It's been answered this very week.

 

It sounds like Heller is basing his 10-20 year prediction on the state of HIS research. Frequency is planning clinical trials next year!

From your CNBC link:
Heller and his team have been working to understand how cells tell each other to regenerate. In five to 10 years, they plan to start testing a few drug compounds on humans. If all goes as planned, their discoveries wouldn't offer a cure for hearing loss but could give people with degenerative hearing loss the option to take a drug and delay getting a hearing aid.

 

For hair cell regeneration, if it works in humans and trials go well, about five years. Phase one starts in second half of 2018. Fingers, toes and eyes crossed!

 

How many years until a therapy for just relieve?

 

See post just above yours........

 

I am not sure if it will take 5 years. The FDA just opened up a super fast track for new medicines that would service a major medical need. So it could be on the market a little sooner, but I am not sure how much time the super fast track would shave off.

 

You are taking it for granted... Frequency says it works, of course they do. It's exciting but we don't know if if works. We don't even know what we mean when we say "it works".

 

Why should the duration matter so much? If you are going to restore the signal what difference does it make.
What about someone who has never heard at all? How do congenitally deaf people hear at all when their cochlear implants are turned on?
A recent interview with Lamba mentions @11:42

Immune Privilege & Regeneration - The...

that in animal models the brain can even sort optic information when it has never even had vision before (the church of cog neuroscience won't like that).
A Van De Berg paper on the vestibular prosthetic showed a sufferer who had no balance for over 20 years who "instantly" responded with eye reflexes to the restoration of information from the replicated ear signal, and that was with a prosthetic, imagine what a replaced biological organ could do.

The body remembers!

We all hear the "tinnitus is in the brain" rhetoric, but often its not mentioned why it began, there is almost ALWAYS an ear lesion. It is well known in the field that cochlear implants often eliminate tinnitus (obviously this is not every case), this can happen even with hearing aids for some, why is this? It is because the information is restored, it is all information.
Haptic information, optic information, hearing (high frequency information) vestibular (low frequency information), olfaction, taste and surely many more systems mammals use to sample the environment that are yet to be be discovered. We are (most of us) born healthy and do not have problems sampling our environment as our body is young and healthy, but then aging happens, for some of us sadly, much too soon.
I am not just expecting tinnitus to reverse, with restoration of the biological organs function, I am looking for increases in reflexes, cognition, spacial awareness, improved balance, personality transformation and even physiological changes in things like heart health, postural control and lung function etc. I am expecting "spectacular" results, especially in the elderly, I really want to see what this technology can do for older adults, I cannot wait to see the effects on those left in a nursing home to rot. Good hearing will turn out to be much more important for health than is currently accepted by medicine.
Its repair/restoration of function through treatment will result in enormous cost saving throughout the world. One might argue that is only the realization of the cost of hearing damage that is driving the current race to clinic.

 

That excactly my concern. Everyones opinio seem to be based on the feedback of those companies. They have investors with millions invested; saying they have something in short future calms down those as well. They mentioned it worked on mice, i would be curieus to see some footage.

 

And let's not forget Frequency says "only" about hearing restoration and this is their target, whether T would improve / diminish together with it is a big questionmark and wishful thinking. Moreover if Liberman is right with his theory that it's the synaptic demage that casues T then I would say it's Decibel which is more likely to help us with T. Don't get me wrong, if Frequency treatment works for hearing restoration this would be a big breakthrough in treating the cochlea but honestly I think we'll have to wait for Decibel to have a T efficiently treated.

 

I know this thread is about Frequency Therapeutics however here where do Decibel Therapeutics and Frequency Therapeutics stand in the race?

If Decibel is more focused on synapse damage than hair cell regeneration than this it's one to watch for tinnitus isn't it?

Let's face it, hearing loss sucks but it's got nothing on tinnitus.

 

Best scenario:
FDA fast approval (Pres.Trump's new regulations)
FT effective treatment
=
<5years

 

I'm pretty sure my 60dB loss at 6000hZ has something to do with the severity of my T...

 

I have a hearing test soon but pretty sure I have no loss, the last one I had the guy said my hearing was good nothing was picked up. Are all tests between 250Hz - 8 kHz they said that was a full hearing assessment?

I wonder how Frequency could help me, tinnitus with no loss??

Also best guesses how much this treatment will be, they're gonna wanna sell it to the rich first.

 

Don't tell me I have to be grateful to Trump for anything to do with Frequency Theraputics fixing our ears. I'm still knitting my 'pussy hat'.

 

Maybe your hearing loss is above 8000Hz, like most people here, and that it will still help ? I guess they can regrow hair cells responsible for the super high frequencies.

But there are also many people in my case here, who would just like to get back some hearing at normal frequencies so they can have a chance to mask T.

 

Is it likely my hearing loss is above 8khz if I got tinnitus through noise? My t frequency is not particularly very high pitched either, I thought what u hear is what you have lost.

 

Nothing? As someone with both . . . what? Hearing loss and tinnitus often coincide. I would not have severe tinnitus if I did not have severe hearing loss. For me personally, habituation would be an easier battle if I could actually hear the world correctly.

Severe tinnitus is awful, I truly hate it. It drives me crazy. But early on the fear that my hearing would continue to decline and leave me unable to hear my children, unable to interact with others . . . those fears truly broke me. I still fear that.

I'm paraphrasing, but Helen Keller once said that deafness separates us from people. I think a drug that can restore hearing will be life changing for anyone with severe or profound hearing loss.

 

250 Hz-8 kHz, full hearing assessment? NO WAY! It only covers half of our hearing spectrum and may I add it covers the least important spectrum regarding T.

Now, we know that HL at 4kHz is very common, and most of us will have a "dip" there. But, in my humble opinion, 90% of the time, when people complain about their T they will describe it as a high pitch hiss/noise.(me included). The higher range is most vulnerable to noise damage, simply bc its closest to our middle ear where the "stirrup" bone hammers on our cochlea. Thus, only covering the lowest frequencies is the biggest misunderstanding among audiologists when it comes to cover the culprit of your T.

The lower half cover most of our day to day input of sounds, yes, like speech, thus makes it more important to audiologists regarding HL. But in accounts to T, it often doesn´t say shit!

I would encourage all of you out there, who think you have normal hearing, to take a hearing test ranging from 8 kHz- 16 kHz. It will probably tell a different story.
My first audiologist, when I demanded to measure the higher end, she reluctantly complied, bc she did not understand what I was going to use it for. Actually she repeated that again and again

I´ll post my two audiograms to show what I mean(the first not by professionals though):



Apart from the "usual" dip at 4kHz I have very good hearing, at lower frequencies, as you can see. I guess, in a way, I´m lucky bc the audiogram to the right quite literally explain my unilateral high frequency T. You see the violent "dip" there. Ouch! The brain has to compensate for that, dose it not? My T is definitely in that area.
Even though I have even worse HL in my left ear, it´s more "smooth" and the brain does not care. No real gaps to fill. I have speculated about what if I could just self inflict some more damage to my HC exactly at 10kHz in my right ear, making it more like the left one? Would that do the trick?

So this is, at least, is my understanding on the matter.

Still, this tells us nothing about wether my damage is in my IHC, OHC or synapses, which leads me to the question, FTX vs. Decibel!

Personally, I believe that our HC, to some degree, actually has the ability to regenerate by themselves(contrary to science, I know). I have had some traumas over the years, where T would generate, staying for a few months, and then slowly vanish again. To me that is not good news according to the treatment FTX has to offer as I may be depleted of my dormant/progenitor cells already. This can of course be an effect of the brain not finding the damage I had, until my latest trauma, to be enough to compensate for in the long run. Sadly, I don´t have any earlier audiograms to compare with.
There are many variables here, I know. The nature of the damage, trigger mechanisms, brain chemistry, psychological awareness etc..

Still, FTX approach is pretty ingenious, is it not? Still, I have some questions
Activating preprogrammed cells, to divide and regenerate, who knows its place and function. But can we be sure they will generate a synaptic connection to the hearing-nerve? Has this been established?
I have read that OHC is not as easy to regenerate, is there any scientific reason for this?
Also, lets say one only has synaptopathy, but the HC itself is alive and kicking.
Firstly, is this even possible? Would´nt you think that when the synapses are retracting from the cell it would be of no use to the brain and die? Can it be like with our teeth, when the nerves connected to it dies, the tooth would too? Maybe this is not the case anyway.
Can the synapses bee seen as a root, nourishing the associated HC? And when they retracts the HC will die as well?
Is it possible that FTX´s drug will pinpoint synaptopathy and replace it with a new HC or will the HC in it self have tobe dead and gone for it to program a new one?

Seems like maybe the the golden bullet, as some have mentioned, would be to eventually have both treatments. Question is then what is likely most profitable to have first? Would one have a diminishing effect of the other?

I can´t wait to see how this will pan out, this is too interesting, and worth living for

To me, its a question of trying to hold back on the benzo as much as I can, until they stick a needle into my ear!

Thanks for reading, obviously I had a lot on my mind!