High-Pitched Tinnitus, Possibly from Nortriptyline or PPI (Proton-Pump Inhibitor)

Hello everyone - I recently signed up to post on a thread about Nortriptyline.

I'm mid-40s and recently have gone through some medical setbacks. A few years ago I herniated discs in my cervical spine (2 minor, 1 a bit more). About 15 months ago out of nowhere I developed a "throatburn" type of heartburn, with a bit of burning in the upper chest. Went on Famotidine to no real help but an increase in upper stomach pain. Bounced around with a bunch of negative tests, went on a PPI for a couple of months, then went on Metoclopramide, by which point the heartburn symptoms moderated ever-so-slightly. Then was put on Metoclopramide + Famotidine, and developed both significant stomach pain and nausea and depression!

So why am I posting here? The doctor stopped those meds, put me on nortriptyline and a different PPI to ease the GI symptoms (functional heartburn, they call it) and it did help a bit, but 2 weeks later when I went to retire for the night... "what's that ringing in my head?" So that's what tinnitus is!

I'd describe my tinnitus as bilateral, but balanced about 80% towards my right ear (like when you adjust the balance control on a stereo). I've estimated around 12 kHz. It comes in two forms, either a hiss (which isn't too bad) or the hiss with a pure tone overlaid on top. The latter gets annoying, especially when the pure tone wavers in and out.

I went to the ENT and audiologist and got an MRI - no hearing loss, nothing obviously wrong (just like with the GI issues). Told me to pause the meds, so I did - 3 weeks for the PPI, 6 weeks for the tricyclic but the tinnitus stayed and the stomach pain came back when I was only on the PPI. So I've been unable to get off the meds for longer than that, but even when off the tinnitus stuck around.

Luckily, because of the depression, I started CBT therapy, and that helps quite a bit, even though the therapist isn't specifically for tinnitus.

The tinnitus is quite annoying when it comes to focusing, but thankfully(!) none of the conditions affect my sleep negatively beyond having to sleep in one specific position (left side). I do miss the quiet (I used to love quiet) but what I tell myself is that when tinnitus is the thing that bothers me most, that's a good thing, because nothing else is bothering me more.

 

Hey @h-p, I was just wondering if your tinnitus has improved at all since this last post?