Tinnitus After Ear Infection — Made Worse by COVID-19 (Omicron) Infection

Hi! I’m Doris. I developed tinnitus in my late 20’s (I’m nearly 40) after a really bad ear infection (related to a throat infection). Since then I hear what I can compare to hearing lots of crickets far away (I mostly hear it when everything is quiet). I also hear my blood pumping (on and off).

But 6 weeks ago I had COVID-19 (Omicron) which was mild, although I had a runny nose for weeks and up to this day I have congested sinuses. I noticed that as soon as I felt sick my tinnitus was more pronounced. I understand now that this was because of the inflammation in the nasal passages that are inevitably connected to the ears.

But I think I made it even worse by using a saline nasal spray that went to my ears (I felt it in my ears straight away). That was a week ago, and now not only is my tinnitus more pronounced but I hear a new sound, a quite loud whistle which is more bothersome that the other sound that I had quite gotten used to.

I went to the ENT who checked my ears and confirmed that I indeed have fluid in both my middle ears. She explained that normally that fluid drains by itself through the Eustachian tubes (that connect the nasal passages with the middle ear) but in my case they’re probably inflamed and blocked because my nose and throat still showed a lot of inflammation (from COVID-19).

I researched long COVID-19, and it seems like it’s caused by an over activation of mast cells (kind of an allergic sort of reaction) which produces lots histamines in your body and they actually have studied how anti histamines have considerably reduced long COVID-19 symptoms in a few people. My ENT prescribed antihistamines and nasal corticosteroids but I refuse to take them due to side effects I have suffered in the past (mental side effects are the worst).

So putting 2 and 2 together (considering also that I’ve had allergies for a long time) I think the inflammation in my ears must have a lot to do with histamines and mast cells, so I want to explore nutrition and maybe natural supplements to see whether I can reduce histamines in my body naturally. I read somewhere here that someone’s tinnitus was 90 % gone by treating mast cell activation. It kind of makes sense. I’ll post the process and results!

 

Hi @DorisDiana.

How are you doing now?

Many of us were prescribed a steroidal nasal spray like Betahistine in the hope that it might help with tinnitus or an ETD. I've not heard of it making tinnitus worse but of course everyone's mileage may vary. I would be interested in whatever you may have found out.

 

So it’s been a roller coaster with my ears the last couple of weeks.

The high pitch tinnitus on my left ear continued for days. I continued to try and eat a vegan low histamine diet, adding histamine lowering foods like fennel, arugula, ginger but didn’t notice any difference.

Interestingly last weekend I started to feel some pain in both my ears and sinuses and I started to think that probably the fluid in my ears got infected, but at the same time the high pitch tinnitus disappeared, for about 3 days.

Then last Monday I decided to take the antibiotic another ENT prescribed (Azithromycin), well that same night the tinnitus came back and also breathlessness and back pain. So I stopped taking the antibiotic and also the Desloratadine that I’d been taking and on Wednesday the tinnitus was gone again. Also that day I’d taken 30 mg Zinc with my breakfast. So I don’t what caused it to go away.

I’ve tried the spray you mentioned but it doesn’t help and it actually gives me weird symptoms in my chest.

 

Hi @DorisDiana, I also had some issues during and after Omicron. Did your tinnitus return to baseline?

 

I no longer have the high pitch tinnitus, it transformed into a radio static kind of sound that doesn’t bother me that much, I mainly hear it at night but I just fall sleep.

But even that sound was really getting to me at the start, to the point I wasn’t sleeping, it’s like I’d become obsessed with it. One day my ever positive mom plainly told me, “accept and continue on” and it was like a switch. I decided that some things I just have to accept, and from that night I was able to sleep.

Now, I must say that on one occasion I noticed my diet made the low frequency tinnitus transform again into high pitch, it was very noticeable because that particular day I’ve had lots of fried, high fat food and that very night I heard the high pitch sound, next day I cleaned up my diet and it disappeared.

 

Best decision ever. Accept and continue. That's what my mom said as well. Unfortunately, I was stubborn. I couldn't make the switch, because of the fluctuating tinnitus. But now I am at the point of accept and continue. My tinnitus started in April, so it took more or less 6 months.

How long was your struggle period - from onset till making the switch?

 

I would say the worst struggle lasted about a month, sleepless nights, adding to that the fact that COVID-19 gave me panic attacks (that I’m just getting under control now). So I’m just trying to continue on.

 

I agree with the accept and continue. Hard to put into practice, but if you're able to make the switch, it's game-changing.

@Johan82 - I have fluctuating tinnitus also. What's yours like? Mine fluctuates by the day. On, off, on, off, ..., by the day.