Tinnitus Increases the Risk of Getting Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s Disease

Tinnitus and risk of Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease: a retrospective nationwide population-based cohort study

The above is grim reading.

Tinnitus patients are 1.54 more likely to develop Alzheimer's disease.

And 1.56 more likely to develop Parkinson's disease.

This was found in a 10-year-long follow-up study, consisting of 12,657 tinnitus patients and 25,314 controls, based in Taiwan.

As if tinnitus wasn't enough by itself, let's all get Parkinson's and Alzheimer's now too!!

 

My guess is that the people whose body is prone to getting tinnitus are also prone to Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. So the event of getting tinnitus hasn't actually changed one's probability of getting those two other diseases.

 

Maybe we will forget we have tinnitus when combined with Alzheimer's?

 

I always thought it was pretty obvious that we would be more likely to get dementia and so on.

I'm not going to read the article, but I wonder how the age of tinnitus onset affects the chances of getting dementia and associated diseases?

 

I reckon there may be a link since people correlate hearing loss with it. However I have a feeling that if it is restored right which is possible then there might not be big worries about this especially if you are young.

 

Either that, or Alzheimer's will make habituation impossible...

 

Indeed it is and one of the reasons I don't read reports particularly of the type in the link you have posted. For many tinnitus is more than enough to contend with throughout life without the need to read such negativity. It is fine if one isn't troubled by such findings and I am not but those that are easily influenced could find this worrying.

I advise people to incorporate positivity into their life, by engaging in the things they like to do and not read things that serve to only make their life more problematic. I say again, it is fine for a person to read this material if they are not going to be overly bothered by it and see it as information. The opposite is true if they are going see it as another problem, in addition to what they already have and therefore is of no help at all.

Michael

 

Well, perhaps people could take possible Alzheimer's symptoms more seriously now. They might also want to make the most of their life, while they are still healthy.

I see that 1 in 14 (or 7.14% of) people over 65 have Alzheimer's. If the risk is 1.5 times higher than that average level, it's 10.7% or one in 9.3...

 

Well, we have to keep in mind that tinnitus is not a precise predictor for getting those things. It would be also good to look at the study design. I guess that the researchers didn't even differentiate the forms of tinnitus so I guess that the results are not really generalizable. In their summary, they even write that there are other comorbidities that may increase the risk. So, no reason to panic.

 

I stand by the previous comments in my post.

All the best
Michael

 

I'm someone who studies the various rows in life tables and looks up the prevalence of diseases and who often runs Google searches using keywords " "some possible weird symptom I've just had" + cancer ". I feel strongly about not ignoring reality. (I read somewhere that most people underestimate their chances of dying/getting ill, whereas the people suffering from clinical depression make accurate estimates of those odds.)

Why?

 

This is definitely the kinda of post that makes me want to leave this site. Really didn't need to see this today.

Let's face it, yeah it might be informative, but there's bugger all we can do about getting AD and PD, so why would we want to know about our increased risk.

We all know we're royally f*#ked. We just try to get through it.

 

You should definitely leave this site if reality bothers you and you want to live a fantasy tale of "everything's going to be fine". Or join the ATA and BTA. LOL

There are things you can do to reduce your risk of Alzheimer's and Parkinson's. Lifestyle choices. Nutrition. Exercise. Keeping your brain agile.

It's good to know tinnitus increases the risk so you can take other measures to reduce the risk. Duh.

 

First of all you can pay for 23andMe test and learn whether you have that mutation that dramatically increases Alzheimer's risk. Second of all, perhaps 10-20 years from now there will be things and tests you can do, and now you know that you should really do them.

 

Honestly, when I read this... I got kinda happy. I know you are probably thinking: WHAT?!, but hear me out.

I'm sorta happy because if it can be proven that tinnitus is more than just a harmless sound, that it actually IS harmful, then that would be an even greater cause/reason to find a treatment/cure.

 

It's a scientific report that needs to be explained properly before people start dissecting it and jumping to the wrong conclusions.

@FGG -- can you help with this?

It seems to me to be saying that it's only a certain type of tinnitus -- not the type caused by noise damage for instance. Also, 1 in 8 people have tinnitus. You could probably make a correlation to a lot of illnesses, but not necessarily causation.

Untreated depression is also more likely to cause these issues -- and many more -- so in that respect I agree with @Michael Leigh.

Thought this was supposed to be a support forum? This post was really rude. I don't want nice people who need support to leave the site.

 

My take after the reading the study is to look at it for what it is, a retrospective study.

A lot of different groups of people get discussed in this paper.

Highlighted were a specific subset of tinnitus sufferers, who acquired idiopathic central tinnitus as they age and drawing the comparison to people who lose olfactory sensation before acquiring dementia. This may be a "soft sign" of early dementia in some cases.

They make a separate note about acquired, untreated hearing loss and dementia which has been known for awhile to be both a risk factor for tinnitus and dementia.

Lots of correlated factors were listing such as loss of income and systemic inflammatory disease.

So it seems to suggest that some of the same things that can give you tinnitus can later cause neurodenegeration (e.g. certain chronic inflammatory conditions) and also idiopathic tinnitus in an older population can be an early sign in some cases

Anyway it's clearly multi factorial and seems more correlatory than causative.

AD and PD are both extremely complex and have a lot of independent and dependent risk factors.

 

I wish you well in your quest. Please understand I thought my last comment on this topic was made clear and prefer not to debate any further on this issue.

All the best
Michael

 

Exactly right @Steph1710 other forums that I visit I meet ex TT members and they leave here because of continuous negativity by certain members. I am often asked if this trend still continues....

Michael

 

Well I for one appreciate your post ajc.

If people in general are ever going to take acoustic trauma seriously, then the risks must be made public knowledge.
We should all know our enemy.
Ignorance constitutes an even greater enemy.

Our aural pathway is obviously a soft target for the entry of seriously damaging acoustic trauma.

After six years of severe tinnitus, I was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease on Thursday of last week.

If I later develop Alzheimer’s I am pretty confident that you guys will be the first to detect it.

Dave x
Jazzer

 

I just wanted to say that I'm so sorry to hear that Jazzer. I don't know much about Parkinson's, but I wish you all the luck in the world when it comes to managing the condition. From reading your posts, I see you have a lot of mental strength and I'm sure that will see you through.

 

Bless you Tanni.

I seem to have had to battle unbelievable odds right from birth.
Not looking for sympathy - just stating the facts.
I guess I have had to become philosophical to get through so far.
I will do my very best.
I have a great family - and not forgetting three beautiful pussy cats - so I should be okay.

Love to you in your own journey,
Dave x
Jazzer

 

It's terrible to hear this news @Jazzer. I can't imagine how difficult this must be for you. My hart goes out to you & your wife Sylvie.

 

"Through the 10-year follow-up period, 398 individuals with tinnitus (3.1%) and 501 control individuals (2.0%) developed AD (P < 0.001), and 211 tinnitus patients (1.7%) and 249 control patients (1.0%) developed PD (P < 0.001)."

Everyone should read the article more carefully. Based on their percentage figures, 12/398 tinnitus and 10/501 normal people developed AD along with 4/211 tinnitus and 3/250 normal people developed PD. Overall there's 1-5 more people develop PD/AD out of hundreds. Is that statistically significant? I don't really think so.

Before everyone scare themselves: 386/398 people did NOT develop AD and 207/211 did NOT develop PD. Just because we have tinnitus doesn't mean we'll get PD or AD. It's a small and minor correlation, not causative. The study suggests we have 1.1% more chances to develop AD and 0.7% more chances to develop PD. Very low chances are still very low.

Also, the study did not address the subset of tinnitus, such as somatic or neuro tinnitus nor did the study address the severity of tinnitus (mild, moderate, severe).

If this article gets some awareness and traction for tinnitus, then I'm all for it but personally, this article is pointless.

 

Thanks FGG -- what would we do without your science brain?

I'm certainly not qualified to interpret this study, but it seemed to me to be mostly referring to tinnitus of unknown cause that could be taken as an early indicator of AD/PD -- not people who have developed tinnitus through noise damage, medication etc. And even then, it seemed pretty tenuous -- Tinnitus sufferers are a large subsection of society, so if the link were that strong we'd surely know of it.

I'm glad the study was shared -- it's interesting for sure. I just thought the heading was a bit too simplistic/misleading, and didn't want people to panic and think the worst. I think we should try to be really careful when interpreting studies, as people who visit this site can be vulnerable.

 

We will cope as well as possible Chris.
Not the end of the world.
Thanks for your concern buddy.

 

I bet if you had had very severe tinnitus for over six years, as I have, and went on to develop Parkinson’s disease, as I have, you would be likely to accept that there is a causal link.

This kind of neurological damage means that neurons are firing day and night - hence the continuous noise of tinnitus.
Severity and volume levels are obviously highly significant, but this study should not be ignored.

 

Tinnitus is a stressor. Stress is bad for health long-term. Easy to extrapolate from that the sorts of diseases that it would lead to.

 

Will you try FX-322 if and when it comes out? Also Ozzy Osborne has Parkinson’s now along with tinnitus. Tinnitus is not a toy. I wish it would be taken seriously.

Peace.

 

FX-322... possibly?

But it would not reverse Parkinson’s diagnosis
- would it.

Best wishes buddy,

Dave xx