Hough Ear Institute's Hair Cell Regeneration Project

Aha, yep I see where you're coming from now. I read this paper and speculated as much - that the problem isn't damage to the nerve fibers themselves but to the OHCs to which they are connected and then the fibres are implicated because they signal damage but I just wasn't entirely sure. That makes sense and is somewhat reassuring to hear!
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4664349/
Also something that I find reassuring is that for most of us, whilst we have some degree of noise trauma/damage to the inner ear we still have a good degree of hearing function etc and so we already have the existing inner ear architecture etc. So maybe that means repair is more straightforward.

 

Hi, I'm really confused. Is there a simple way of explaining this? Will it be able to help people like me who have had t for a long time, in my case 38 years? Originally started from ear infection, but worse now due to hearing loss.
Thanks for any info you can give me.

 

Basically, yes. HPN-07 (Hough pill) combined with N-acetylcysteine showed effectiveness in rescuing auditory nerve fibers outside of the immediate window... “Permanent threshold shift was established by open field blast insult. Treatment was initiated at 4 weeks post-injury,with HPN-07 plus NAC dosed at 300 mg/kg twice daily for 14 days. ABR threshold improvements were shown 14 weeks post-injury (8 weeks post-treatment) versus pre-treatment.

FIG. 29 shows NHPN-1010 treatment (HPN-07 plus NAC) restored IHC ribbon synapse numbers in established, chronic hearing loss model. NHPN-1010 treatment was initiated 4 weeks after injury and dosed daily for 14 days. Ribbon synapse counts were significantly restored 8 weeks post-injury.”

The huge hurdle here is funding, and then admission to phase 2(?)

 

Not to hijack (you can PM me and I can delete this post), but if you wouldn’t mind telling the cause, severity, and if it just gradually diminished over time?

 

Thank you, still quite complicated tho or I'm having a blonde moment.
Let's hope they get the funding after 38 years I could do with a break!

 

We will probably find out more in the podcast that will be conducted soon!

 

The simple short answer is maybe :/

Sorry, I wish we could say for sure but we cant without knowing what structure is damaged inside the ear. Could be synapses, nerve fibers, OHC, IHC, or a combination of all of them.

Some people will see benefit from the pill, some won’t. But if the pill doesn’t work there are many other avenues of treatment coming up. I firmly agree with brokensoul that if your tinnitus is generated from cochlear damage then relief is coming in one form or another.

Many of us will likely need more than one piece of the regenerative puzzle though.

 

@HootOwl
Thank you for taking the time to reply. I guess it's a waiting game, hopefully not too much longer. Had this since I was 23 and I'm now 61, would really like to hear silence or a quieter tinnitus.
Fingers crossed for all of us.

 

Man, I really hope that some combination of hair/cell synaptic regeneration would help cure hyperacusis. My main worry is whether hyperacusis (specifically noxacusis) if it's a form of neuropathic pain could become centralised over time. I recall reading a post someone made on the forums touching on this a while back. Therefore would solving the damage at the original site (ie damaged OHCs) end up being a full solution. I guess there's still so much to uncover but only time will tell.

 

Yeah I’d bank on this for acute phases and sub-chronic phases mostly. Although they’ve shown efficacy in the regeneration space, I wouldn’t rely on a potent antioxidant in chronic cases—there, I’d expect (mostly) FX-322 and possibly OTO-413/PIPE-505 (if speech-in-noise is the primary problem) to be the primary treatment. Could give a shit less about the procedures, shoot me up. But it’d still be great knowing you could go to your doctor if and get a (pricey) pill in the likely event docs are negligent and don’t refer you to immediate dexamethasone injection/high dose oral steroid upon tinnitus presentation.

I know you know this (and way more) haha just wanted to qualify my opinion of “basically yes”

 

I really, really think this is unlikely. I’m not well read on hyperacusis at all but the likelihood that tinnitus becomes centralized (which I don’t believe) is infinitely more viable than hyper/noxacusis becoming centralized. I’ve dealt with chronic pain twice separately, for about two years each time, and those experiences have anecdotally proven to me that the signal either gets down regulated over time, or I’ve habituated to it.

 

Really hope it’s the much awaited phase 2 announcement.

 

Thank you Hazel.

 

That's great!

I would like to specifically mention here how patient and persistent the Tinnitus Talk team has been while struggling with multiple technical issues. Thank you!

 

I’m in. Is JimH still matching donations or was that only for the Vancouver trip?

 

@Markku, @Hazel, @Autumnly, @Liz Windsor thank you so much for making this happen!

 

Just listened to the podcast. Very interesting. But I am a bit confused after reading the official press on this:

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-rel...hough-ear-institute-scientists-301003204.html

It looks like the initial phase 2 isn't looking at tinnitus or speech in noise. How exactly are they accessing synapse regrowth clinically then? Or is the first phase 2 just going to be post acute noise exposure and looking at audiograms?

Maybe this was answered somehow and I didn't hear it right. I will check the transcript when it comes out.

 

Is it for chronic tinntius? And for all tinnitus?

 

So trial participants will have abnormal audiograms then? Because if they were looking at cochlear synaptopathy, shouldn't Speech in Noise be included? So it seems that in this first phase 2 they are looking at audiograms?

If that were the case they are looking for participants with acute damage and acute audiogram changes then right? Because it doesn't regrow hair cells.

 

I haven’t listened to the podcast as I need the transcript.

Did it state when they are starting Phase 2 and when they will finish it?

 

They said they expect the first phase 2 (it is implied there will be more than one phase 2 I thought) to begin in 2020 and the drug to be out mid decade. They aren't testing this on tinnitus patients in this next phase but hope to later.

 

They said for they saw evidence for noise induced but that's also the only etiology they tested I think. They believe it will help chronic cases but are going to do more pre-clinical testing soon to confirm.

 

One point I want to highlight is Dr. Kopke believes fixing the cochlea will result in treating tinnitus. He doesn't believe it's "stuck in the brain" and he uses his 1/2 to 2/3 of tinnitus patients with hearing loss improving even with just hearing aids as further evidence of this.

 

That’s interesting. If FX-322 doesn’t solve all of our problems we might need a combination of FX-322 and HEI Pill.

 

This is so exciting. Did they mention whether this might help hyperacusis?