16 kHz Hearing Loss — Intratympanic Steroids or Stem Cells?

vttbx

Member
Author
Benefactor
Aug 9, 2015
308
Los Angeles
Tinnitus Since
01/2001
Cause of Tinnitus
Noise Induced
I am two weeks out of a noise exposure with considerable loss at 16 kHz. Lots of threads here on both treatments but I was wondering if anyone has had success with either. IT carries many risks and would need a series of four. Stem Cells are hard to find in the US. Or is recovery at that high of a frequency not possible?
 
I am two weeks out of a noise exposure with considerable loss at 16 kHz. Lots of threads here on both treatments but I was wondering if anyone has had success with either. IT carries many risks and would need a series of four. Stem Cells are hard to find in the US. Or is recovery at that high of a frequency not possible?
Why would you even want to recover at 16 kHz? It's way outside the speech range.
 
Neither is a guarantee but I would definitely do the steroids if it were me over stem cells acutely. It seems to make a pretty big difference in sudden hearing loss.
 
Why would you even want to recover at 16 kHz? It's way outside the speech range.

Because my entire frequency response has been affected. I have always had a dip at 8k which hasn't changed. Things now sound vastly different. I'll explain more in another post.
 
Neither is a guarantee but I would definitely do the steroids if it were me over stem cells acutely. It seems to make a pretty big difference in sudden hearing loss.

My doctor told me the SSHL is more associated with a viral cause rather than noise-induced. So fewer studies on IT for NIHL.
 
I am two weeks out of a noise exposure with considerable loss at 16 kHz. Lots of threads here on both treatments but I was wondering if anyone has had success with either. IT carries many risks and would need a series of four. Stem Cells are hard to find in the US. Or is recovery at that high of a frequency not possible?
I'm so sorry that happened. I'm guessing the NMN/NR wasn't much help?
 
Damn, maybe I should have gone then. I just didn't see any point in risking doing the other tests.
I refused to go through the other tests. The audiologist just looked at me like "what is wrong with you?" Then he called on Christopher (the manager for the whole project), who came in and had a chat with me for two ours about tinnitus, then he offered me and extended audiogram.
 
I refused to go through the other tests. The audiologist just looked at me like "what is wrong with you?" Then he called on Christopher (the manager for the whole project), who came in and had a chat with me for two ours about tinnitus, then he offered me and extended audiogram.

An audiologist got MAD at me for refusing to do a tympanometropany test. She was like 65, I'm amazed she doesn't realize that for some people that test is dangerous after all those years
 
I am two weeks out of a noise exposure with considerable loss at 16 kHz. Lots of threads here on both treatments but I was wondering if anyone has had success with either. IT carries many risks and would need a series of four. Stem Cells are hard to find in the US. Or is recovery at that high of a frequency not possible?
For me it makes no sense to search treatment, involving drugs like steroids, let alone stem cells, just for a loss on such a high frequency... even if it affects your tinnitus, I think you are likely to get back to baseline. The tinnitus is a consequence of hearing loss normally, but it also can get reactive to the frequency you don't hear, when you hear that sound above your hearing threshold. However, 16 kHz is a very high frequency... Do you perceive sounds on that frequency often? Which sort of sounds?
 
They exist. I made one through "STOP-projektet".
Could you share it with the rest of us? ;)

I forgot all about that project. :)

Project website:
https://stop.ki.se/

Damn, maybe I should have gone then. I just didn't see any point in risking doing the other tests.
What other tests? Tympanometry?

An audiologist got MAD at me for refusing to do a tympanometropany test. She was like 65, I'm amazed she doesn't realize that for some people that test is dangerous after all those years

I have done the tympanometry once. Not as part of the STOP study, but I also did the questionnaire part of the STOP study. Haha! I'm the best! Only answered some questions! (y) It's not my fault. They never called me in to do the test. Not everyone was called in I believe. You had to be a good candidate I guess... Anyway! When I did the tympanometry test, I did in a hospital setting, and it did not change my tinnitus. It is fairly safe. Fast forward 2 years and my tinnitus worsened doing a plank at the gym. :rolleyes:
 
@Samir You mean my audiogram result?

They wanted to do a lot of loud tests, but I don't know the name of them. I remember it was tympanometry, and other tests that can reach up to 90 dB.

I only did the extended audiogram and LDL (loudness discomfort levels).
 
Here is my audiogram up to 16kHz.
 

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The tinnitus is a consequence of hearing loss normally, but it also can get reactive to the frequency you don't hear, when you hear that sound above your hearing threshold.

Can you elaborate please? Listening to the "problem frequency" even if you don't hear it because of hearing loss can ramp up tinnitus, is that what you mean?
 
What other tests? Tympanometry?

Yes that, but mainly the Auditory brainstem response test or whatever it's called. I think it's 90 dB sounds in headphones for an hour or so. Not exactly my idea of a constructive thing to do with my time :headphone:
 
@Samir You mean my audiogram result?

They wanted to do a lot of loud tests, but I don't know the name of them. I remember it was tympanometry, and other tests that can reach up to 90 dB.

I only did the extended audiogram and LDL (loudness discomfort levels).
No, it was my attempt at making a joke. But what I meant to say is that extended hearing tests are not readily available for anyone at any local audiologist office, even when the testing equipment is capable of it. The reason you got one is that you were taking part in a research study where they decided it would be a good idea to go beyond the 8 kHz limit.

Why most audiologists will normally only test your hearing up to 8 kHz is because that's where the upper bound of the human speech is. This is the so called "speech banana" you can somteimes see on an audiogram. Next time you do a hearing test, you can ask your audiologist to overlay your audiogram with a banana before it's printed out! :)

Although human speech (banana included) flactuates somewhat, depending on the definition (vowels 8 kHz vs. consonants 6 kHz), it is generally said that 8 kHz is the upper bound of human speech. The is what an audiologist will tell you, and that's not a lie, but there is more to this though that they will not tell you. The less obvious reason why audiologists don't go above 8 kHz when doing a hearing test, even when they have the right equipment for it (not all of them do unfortunately), is that most hearing aids don't have the capability to amplify sounds beyond 8 to 10 kHz. So their objective, as audiologists, is to see if they can fit you with a suitable hearing aid. Their job is not to do scientific testing of your hearing ability. And that is more telling than anything about this whole "industry".

Thanks for sharing the diagram though! From the looks of your diagram, you have a very good hearing. The "U" shaped marks represent hearing levels with masking if I recall correctly. I can see from the diagram also that they at least have the capability to do a number of other tests:
  • DLI
  • QuickSIN
  • Bekesy
  • LIPread
  • Tinnitus
  • Ljudstyrka - skalning
Differential Limen for Intensity
The perceptual characteristics of tinnitus are usually assessed by a matching procedure, where loudness and pitch of an external sound are matched to those of the tinnitus percept. The duration discrimination test (DDT), differential limen for intensity (DLI) and differential limen for frequency (DLF) are relatively simple psychoacoustic methods of measuring differential sensitivity.
Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6750796/

Speech In Noise
SIN refers to Speech In Noise. But here, QuickSIN refers to a software product by Interacoustics. Which reveals that the lab has access to testing equipment made by Interacoustics. Nice!
Difficulty with hearing in background noise is a common complaint among hearing aid users. Therefore, the measurement of SNR loss (signal-to-noise ratio loss) is important because a person's ability to understand speech in noise cannot be reliably predicted from the pure tone audiogram. The QuickSIN test was developed to provide a quick estimate of SNR loss. A list of six sentences with five key words per sentence is presented in four-talker babble noise. The sentences are presented at pre-recorded signal-to-noise ratios which decrease in 5-dB steps from 25 (very easy) to 0 (extremely difficult). The SNRs used are: 25, 20, 15, 10, 5 and 0, encompassing normal to severely impaired performance in noise.
Source: https://www.interacoustics.com/guides/test/audiometry-tests/quick-speech-in-noise-quicksin

Békésy
Békésy audiometry, also called decay audiometry - audiometry in which the subject controls increases and decreases in intensity as the frequency of the stimulus is gradually changed so that the subject traces back and forth across the threshold of hearing over the frequency range of the test. The test is quick and reliable, so [it] was frequently used in military and industrial contexts.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audiometry#Subjective_audiometry

LIPread
Lipreading test? I don't how or why you would measure someone's ability to lipread. Perhaps LIP means something else in this context?

Tinnitus
I'm not sure what this is used for. Some note taking? Maybe it's for tinnitus questionnaires like Tinnitus Handicap Inventory? It may even contain the obtained results of the patient, for each patient had to fill out a length questionnaire and send it to KI by mail. Upon which they then selected patients for additional lab testing.

Ljudstyrka - skalning
Ljudstyrka literally means sound strength. Skalning means scaling. So this is likely where they put in the data points for LDL (Loudness Discomfort Levels). This is a scary one, one I think people with tinnitus should reconsider doing. Note that they are often administered as part of or immediately following a Tympanometry (Greek for "drum measure", i.e. pressure testing).
The loudness discomfort level (LDL) is the level (intensity of sound) at which a patient reports sound to be uncomfortably loud.

Loudness discomfort levels (LDL) may also be called uncomfortable loudness levels (UCLs) or threshold of discomfort (TDs).

It should be noted that the loudness discomfort levels are variable between individuals, with a normal variation of about 20 dB. This means that one person may have a LDL of 90dB and another may have a LDL of 110dB at the same frequency.
Source: https://www.everydayhearing.com/hearing/audiology/loudness-discomfort-levels/
 
Here is my audiogram up to 16kHz.
That's a perfect audiogram. Can you swap it with mine? :-P

The LDLs seem pretty low though. Was it because you were already feeling very bothered by sound at 55 - 60 dB or because you didn't want to risk it with higher decibels?
 

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