Tinnitus for 10 Months — Thoughts on the Cause, Using Earbuds at Nearly Full Blast for Years?

Hey there - long time lurker first time poster.

Would love opinions:

Tinnitus started September 2019. I’m 37 years old, and hit me out of nowhere. Did a steroid course, vitamins, ginkgo, ear wax, chiropractor, acupuncture, dental check. Nothing. My tinnitus is maskable, lighter in the AM, tones and Hisses. I won’t go into how much it’s disrupted my life, because if you’re reading this, you know. I’m able to work and function again.

In January 2019, I had a crazy sinus infection. Had to take antibiotics. Then I had surgery, which required more antibiotics. Then I had a second surgery and guess what - more antibiotics.

For the past few years, I’ve been listening to earbuds while working out - and admittedly, I’d go full blast or close to it. Probably 4 or so times per week, 45 minutes at a time. I couldn't ever hear the music - never seemed loud enough but didn’t have any hearing trouble. I didn’t really know or think it was a dangerous Level. I know now that isn’t true. I have stopped all earphone or earbud usage since.

My audiograms all look very good for my age. I’ve been tested up to 15,000 Hz, and I can’t hear much after 13,500 Hz but was told that is normal (is it?). I feel like my hearing is fine. Speech in word tests are fine. All my ear anatomy from those VEMP and ECOG tests are fine.

I feel like my b12 was very low going into this (vegetarian diet) My Vitamin D was off too.

So the question is - what got me? I have to believe the earbuds set it off. In a way, I’m hopeful I have hearing loss / hidden or otherwise - as the drug pipeline is most robust for this root cause. But I really do not seem to struggle with hearing and all of my hearing tests are really good.

What do you think?

 

Were they all ototoxic antibiotics?

 

I believe they were all Cipro.

 

I should note, the tinnitus didn’t start until about 5 months after the end of the antibiotics courses, and I never had any Tinnitus while on the meds.

 

That has got to be the cause...

 

It could very well be. Or a combination of all of this. I just hope that the hearing drugs in the works can help me, as I don’t have explicit hearing loss.

 

Sometimes it can take a week or two for tinnitus to start, but I guess the above means that antibiotics didn't directly cause your tinnitus...

 

I believe Cipro, in part, caused my tinnitus.

 

They could have weakened them, making the earbuds more effective at letting the tinnitus come through. Impossible to know. I’m just hopeful that the current drug pipeline (Fx322, Pipe505, Oto413) could help me, despite the healthy audiograms. I’d rather not be a unique case with this disease. I want to be like everyone else so there’s a shot big pharma can help me.

 

Only getting to 13.5 khz for your age range is a little low. 15khz is what's average for most under 40. Do you have your extended audiogram to look at? Are there any notches along it? Have you been able to match your tinnitus tone?

 

Hi Will - thanks for relying. 13,500 felt really low too, to me. My audiogram has a little notch. at 2500 or so.

Extended Audiogram attached.

 

And I can’t really match my tone, but if I play 2700hz I get residual Inhibition. I have a beeping tone at 1000 ish in my right ear. Doesn’t bother me as much.

 

Here’s my audiology at Tinnitus onset for the up to 8000hz range.

 

That says you have a dip, but can hear 20khz. If that's true, that's impressive. Also, if true, fx-322 should be able to help you for hf ranges. The lower ranges might take some work on, and maybe oto-413 as they look really good to me. Then again, I'm not a doctor, so I can't guarantee anything.

 

Thanks Will. I definitely cannot hear 20khz! I assure you of that! At any volume I cannot hear above 13.5khz. Not sure why the audiogram shows that, if so, it’s perhaps just a limit to the test or something.

 

Probably. Well, I can tell you that if your tinnitus range is within your hearing spectrum, then fx-322 or Oto-413 should help if they work as intended. Fx-322 might help even if it isn't, but we don't know that for certain yet. Having hair cells reconnect might "wake up" the brain and lead to correct adjustment for lost hearing. We just don't know.

As for what got you, I would say systemic ignorance on the dangers to hearing got you. Although I don't subscribe to the "All headphones are bad" ethos of many, I do think we have widespread ignorance of how loud we're actually listening to things. Would be nice if we had some sort of more accurate volume control, telling us an estimated DB level instead of just "15\30". Earbuds are certainly an issue, and harming kids and the uninformed as well. I hope it gets better for you, and that you're treatable with the Regen pipeline. If not, rl-81 is in the works, and gateway biotech is working on another brain centered treatment.

 

Thanks Deb.

Yup, I think it played a part for me too. I have to imagine there was a weakening of my hearing with antibiotics, and then noise set it free.

 

I agree with all of your thoughts. The good news is that there are a ton of people working on therapies. I am also interested in XEN-1101 as a Potassium Channel Opener, like RL-81. I’m not sure what I think about the Hough Ear Pill, but I’m pleased they are at least trying something.

10, 15 years ago there weren’t nearly as many people researching this. A multi-factor approach (Regen, Brain chemistry, etc) is likely the path to a full treatment.

I worry most that once an acute solution is created, we then become the chronic cases with a life sentence as companies will stop focusing on our group.

 

Same JR, same. Hopefully, that doesn't happen. Having many options to treat this would still be better. Further, it would make it easier to deal with on the field, as in the military. We'll see how it goes.

 

The issue is that acute is a bit of an ambiguous term. Some consider three months acute, some consider twelve months acute.

Besides, there's a HUGE market for those with chronic tinnitus. Way bigger than acute cases. While I share the same worry, I don't think it's very likely.

 

Right. There are estimated 50m Tinnitus sufferers worldwide. Not all would seek treatment, maybe 10-15%, which leaves 5-7.5m people that would try a therapy (maybe more? If Regen drugs solve half of those cases, that leaves 2.5-3.75m people that may elect a treatment for chronic tinnitus. Additionally, the regen products don’t explicitly have tinnitus as an efficacy indication (FX322 has it as a secondary). Which means that insurance providers may not pay for it if there’s no hearing loss driving people to a Tinnitus-specific therapy. Add in the fact that the military has a sea of chronic cases that they are paying, and it still makes a business case for solving this problem. If a therapy costs $750 USD and there’s a 15% margin after all of the dev and production and administration costs, someone still stands to make around a half a billion in profit.

Let’s hope that capitalism takes over To keep all the products moving forward.

 

I agree with you. There is a very big market here. HIV now has a ton of prevention drugs, but there’s still a ton of $ going into treatment therapies of chronic cases.

It’s easy to worry about drug companies leaving us behind, but there are many people on the field trying to solve, and likely room for many. I know it’s a favorite anxiety spiral of mine.

 

Fluoroquinolones are known to derange the GABA A receptors. I'm so sorry this has happened to you too.

 

Not to mention some of the scientists have hearing loss or loved ones with hearing loss.

 

Yes, that’s true. Many have Tinnitus and hearing loss. Dr Tzounopoulos has it, I believe Rauschecker has it, I read somewhere Susan Shore has it... at least it’s good, smart company.

 

Thanks Deb. You too - we’ll figure it out. Sounds like you’ve done so much from your posts.

Funny you mention GABA - Ativan and Xanax definitely help my tinnitus to some degrees. Maybe a link - who knows.

 

They are horrible antibiotics. Doctors act like they do nothing bad, yet they will never tell you about the blackbox warning of rupturing your tendon. Xanax and Ativan will help most people's tinnitus at first but then things go down hill and you can hit tolerance. Once you get off the benzo it can make the sound louder. Just be careful. Let your brain heal from the antibiotics.

 

I managed to pull my drug history - here's what I took (for what it's worth)...

December 2018 - Amoxicillin, a ten day course, I believe it was 125mg course
January 2019 - Cephalexin (Keflex) 7 day course at 500mg / day
March 2019 - Cephalexin (Keflex) 7 day course at 500mg / day

Tinnitus bursts noticed in August, 2019
Full-on, nonstop Tinnitus Sept 22, 2019

Three courses of Antibiotics in 4 months is a lot, but these are not huge schedules / doses, and the tinnitus showed up much later.

Just interesting correlation.

 

I also used a Clindamycin topically for a week or so in Aug 2019. I would be surprised if a topical gel could cause ototoxicity / tinnitus, but then again, who the heck knows.

Amoxicillin is not ototoxic, so that isn't a root cause. Hmmm this is a stumper.