30+ Years of Tinnitus Possibly from Loud Manufacturing Job — Now It's Bothering Me More

[Redwarf]

Hi there, my tinnitus began around age 18. I believe it was caused by my loud manufacturing job. I didn't know this thing had a name until I heard William Shatner talk about his on the tonight show. By this time I was using my Bose wave CD player as my back ground noise so I could fall asleep. Violin concertos were my best friend. I finally got to the point that I could sleep without the help of background noise.

I've just been chugging along all these years and no doctor has ever offered me any kind of help or tests or advice. People think I'm wimpy to complain about it sometimes as they just don't understand how absolutely unbearable it can be. I have been reading through these forums and I saw someone say their tinnitus had a decibel level. Please enlighten me as to what doctor I should be seeking out to help me.

In the last few months it has gotten harder to cope with. It's not louder, just can't ignore it as much as I used to. At just about 50 years old I would love to know what silence is like again.

 

[LilSass]

Hi @Redwarf!

I am 9 months in myself and am still trying to figure out the cause and if there's anything I can do about it, besides habituation. I saw an audiologist who was able to measure my hearing above 8kHz and determined the health of my cochlea with an OAE (Otoacoustic Emission) test. She determined my tinnitus was around 1kHz, 30 dB at its loudest (I got lucky that day - the volume fluctuates daily). Mine isn't caused by acoustic damage - this was confirmed with the hearing test because tinnitus is normally the pitch of the hearing loss. They may recommend TRT, which works for a lot of people. The audiologist I saw has tinnitus herself and says she rarely notices it (fourth level of habituation).

Good luck!

 

[Thuan]

I'm sorry to say there isn't a cure or even an effective treatment to reduce tinnitus because most people, including medical professionals, do not view tinnitus as a serious issue to solve.

However, there is currently research into repairing hearing loss in the hope that it can reduce tinnitus because tinnitus often correlate with some hearing loss. Most people with tinnitus seem to have normal hearing (20 Hz to 8 kHz) but in fact have hearing loss in the ultra high frequencies (beyond 8 kHz). I can attest to this fact that my good ear can hear frequencies beyond 15 kHz clearly and loudly but my bad, tinnitus ear can not hear anything at all at 14 kHz and up. Because I have a good ear for reference, I know that my tinnitus sounds exactly like 14 kHz, which is where my ultra high frequency lost starts.

Currently, Frequency Therapeutics is the most promising research and results should be released next year. Until then, we'll just have to wait and see.