Contact the ATA Right Now — 3 Minutes to Make a Difference

[Jrblovsky]

The $2.7 million might well have been lit on fire. Maybe they should hire former Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick. He is out of jail now and could make sure those funds are allocated accordingly.

Odds 10 to 1 they spend the cash 90% administrative costs and overhead. The other 10% goes to funding Acceptance and Commitment Therapy research.

 

[valeri]

I got no response. Then again, they can tell from my email address that I am not in the US, so maybe they don't care much about my opinion.

They don't care about tinnitus sufferers or their opinion regardless of geography. Yet they always care to collect money from the funds raised after someone commits suicide due to tinnitus... Oops... I meant depression since everyone with tinnitus (according to the ATA) lives happily ever after!

 

[Watasha]

The $2.7 million might well have been lit on fire. Maybe they should hire former Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick. He is out of jail now and could make sure those funds are allocated accordingly.

Odds 10 to 1 they spend the cash 90% administrative costs and overhead. The other 10% goes to funding Acceptance and Commitment Therapy research.

Hi @Jrblovsky! The ATA has historically not contributed much of their contributions to research, but the research they fund has been cure based for a good while. Here is their past research. The roadmap to a cure pretty much prevents them from funding CBT-like grants.

Past ATA Funded Research

I am sure spending a 2-3 minutes on an email to them would be worthwhile!

 

[Watasha]

They don't care about tinnitus sufferers or their opinion regardless of geography. Yet they always care to collect money from the funds raised after someone commits suicide due to tinnitus... Oops... I meant depression since everyone with tinnitus (according to the ATA) lives happily ever after!

My experiences with them indicates that they DO care, but not in the most effective way. Perhaps you could share your story with them and how you've been impacted and request that they spend the money on research and not call lines?

 

[Jrblovsky]

Hi @Jrblovsky! The ATA has historically not contributed much of their contributions to research, but the research they fund has been cure based for a good while. Here is their past research. The roadmap to a cure pretty much prevents them from funding CBT-like grants.

Past ATA Funded Research

I am sure spending a 2-3 minutes on an email to them would be worthwhile!

I will do it to support the cause, but I feel it's a waste and that if they honestly cared they would have been advocating and procuring funding for this 30 years ago.

 

[Jrblovsky]

Has anyone thought about the idea that some of these academic people don't even care about tinnitus research? For them, doing sociology studies is just a short time thing they involve themselves in so that they have something to put on their resume. They're all about making it big, and all this sociology research is just something to add to their resume.

You hit the nail on the head.

 

[Watasha]

You hit the nail on the head.

ATA does not fund sociology studies. They do fail in the amount of contributions that they receive being dedicated to research though.

 

[ajc]

Any new updates from the ATA? I guess they didn't read the memo on there being a Tinnitus Week.

 

[wwtsai]

Any new updates from the ATA? I guess they didn't read the memo on there being a Tinnitus Week.

Yeah, makes me sad how mum they are compared to the BTA.

 

[Gareth Davies]

I don't know if I've missed the opening, but I sent them an email as well.

 

[reggie green]

Hi there,

My first ever comment on this forum.

I think a lot more people would email the ATA if they had an example email to copy paste from.

I'm not native English speaker, so someone else could have drafted this better.

Anyway, here's my proposal for a template if you want to copy paste it:

To whom it may concern,

I read the American Tinnitus Association has received a bequest of $2.7 million.

Please use this bequest wisely. Invest it exclusively in research focused on finding a cure for tinnitus.

I'm a member of the Tinnitus Talk forums. Please check out the discussion thread below to keep the ATA up to date on the needs of the tinnitus patient community. Please engage in conversation with me and others who are hoping you use the bequest as effectively as possible:

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/posts/569992/

Sincerely,

I sent them your template. Thank you.

 

[shelbynn]

They don't seem to be very transparent. I reached out to them in tears a few days ago looking for help from an audiologist who can help me manage my tinnitus/noise distortion (potentially mild hyperacusis) and this woman called me right when I was starting to feel suicidal again and she spent 2 hours on the phone with me. She was so compassionate and understanding. It helped me tremendously. She got me in touch with an audiologist I'm trying to go make a 3 hour trek to go see. It might be worth it to save my life.

 

[Jrblovsky]

They don't seem to be very transparent. I reached out to them in tears a few days ago looking for help from an audiologist who can help me manage my tinnitus/noise distortion (potentially mild hyperacusis) and this woman called me right when I was starting to feel suicidal again and she spent 2 hours on the phone with me. She was so compassionate and understanding. It helped me tremendously. She got me in touch with an audiologist I'm trying to go make a 3 hour trek to go see. It might be worth it to save my life.

Cleveland Clinic and Duke are supposed to have good audiologists. Don't waste your time with University of Michigan or any local ones in metro Detroit. Dr. Gantz at the University of Iowa is very good I heard as well.

 

[Watasha]

They don't seem to be very transparent. I reached out to them in tears a few days ago looking for help from an audiologist who can help me manage my tinnitus/noise distortion (potentially mild hyperacusis) and this woman called me right when I was starting to feel suicidal again and she spent 2 hours on the phone with me. She was so compassionate and understanding. It helped me tremendously. She got me in touch with an audiologist I'm trying to go make a 3 hour trek to go see. It might be worth it to save my life.

Just curious, which audiologist did she recommend?

 

[cruise]

They don't seem to be very transparent. I reached out to them in tears a few days ago looking for help from an audiologist who can help me manage my tinnitus/noise distortion (potentially mild hyperacusis) and this woman called me right when I was starting to feel suicidal again and she spent 2 hours on the phone with me. She was so compassionate and understanding. It helped me tremendously. She got me in touch with an audiologist I'm trying to go make a 3 hour trek to go see. It might be worth it to save my life.

Good to hear that you got a good conversation that helped you.

 

[shelbynn]

@Watasha, @Jrblovsky:

Dr. Stelios Dokianakis in Holland, MI. I still haven't been out there and I'm planning on filling out the paperwork and getting my audiograms and other medical records to them this weekend/week.

 

[Reggie Wedgie]

ATA got my email a week ago, however I haven't got a reply back.

At least they know what I think.

 

[Boardguy14]

Let's be real.

(Source)

 

[Watasha]

Let's be real.

View attachment 43274

(Source)

Oh yeah, this is no secret. They haven't seemed to be very open to change as well.

 

[BrStan@]

The BTA and the ATA are two organizations that are corrupt and compete useless in finding a cure for tinnitus.

They should not exist. Wouldn't it be nice if the money they receive was being directly donated to one of the researchers like professor Josef Rauschecker who is also lacking funding.

 

[Watasha]

The BTA and the ATA are two organizations that are corrupt and compete useless in finding a cure for tinnitus.

They should not exist. Wouldn't it be nice if the money they receive was being directly donated to one of the researchers like professor Josef Rauschecker who is also lacking funding.

My opinion is that corrupt may be a little harsh and I disagree regarding them being useless (each for different reasons).

That said, both of them need structural reform and the BTA seems to be a pretty well run, transparent machine that works very well with Tinnitus Talk it appears.

I am a big fan of Dr. Rauschecker myself.

 

[Nobody19]

Is any follow-up being done here?

 

[Nobody19]

I'm not sure if this is the right topic, but this is good news (a copy paste from the ATA's Facebook page):

The ATA is pleased to award $120,000 in tinnitus seed research funding to Pim van Dijk, PhD, medical physicist-audiologist and professor of audiology, University of Groningen, Netherlands.

Dr. van Dijk will use the funding to test whether deficits in GABAergic neurotransmission could be responsible for the occurrence of tinnitus in individuals with high-frequency hearing loss.

If the research confirms deficient GABA signaling as a cause for tinnitus, it will encourage new clinical research to alleviate tinnitus by enhancing GABA neurotransmission in the auditory pathway.

For a list of Dr. van Dijk's 146 publications, visit: https://www.rug.nl/staff/p.van.dijk/research

Congratulations, Dr. van Dijk!

 

[Nobody19]

Another grant, one which I'm much less enthusiastic about:

The ATA is pleased to award $60,000 in tinnitus seed research funding to Sylvie Hébert, PhD, Professor, School of Speech Pathology and Audiology, Faculty of Medicine, at the Université de Montréal, CAN.

Dr. Hébert will use the funding to investigate the use of sound therapy to improve tinnitus and sleep through a placebo-controlled ecological study.

A study in Noise and Health Journal found that 54% of people with tinnitus also had a sleep disorder. Dr. Hébert is a leading tinnitus researcher committed to advancing patient care in this area.

Carefully selected interventions will allow for comparisons of not only the effectiveness of sound therapy, but also potential mechanisms underlying sleep and tinnitus.

Congratulations, Dr. Hébert!

A total of $265,000 has been awarded for the ATA 2021 Innovative Tinnitus Research Grants Program.

 

[Watasha]

Another grant, one which I'm much less enthusiastic about:

This one is disappointing. We should all be making noise on their social media about this.

 

[Uklawyer]

If the research confirms deficient GABA signaling as a cause for tinnitus, it will encourage new clinical research to alleviate tinnitus by enhancing GABA neurotransmission in the auditory pathway.

I thought we knew that upregulation of GABA has a beneficial effect on tinnitus as shown through the efficacy of benzodiazepines on numbers of tinnitus sufferers.

Is it possible to comment on the award of these grants?

 

[Nobody19]

Is it possible to comment on the award of these grants?

Yes, these are copy pastes from their Facebook page. You can comment on them.

 

[MBH]

No checks and balances with the ATA. I left a message on phone, they never called me back. They can't even answer the basics. And when their phone messages are only asking for money, that is not good.

 

[Frédéric]

Another grant, one which I'm much less enthusiastic about:

The ATA is pleased to award $60,000 in tinnitus seed research funding to Sylvie Hébert, PhD, Professor, School of Speech Pathology and Audiology, Faculty of Medicine, at the Université de Montréal, CAN.

Dr. Hébert will use the funding to investigate the use of sound therapy to improve tinnitus and sleep through a placebo-controlled ecological study.

A study in Noise and Health Journal found that 54% of people with tinnitus also had a sleep disorder. Dr. Hébert is a leading tinnitus researcher committed to advancing patient care in this area.

Carefully selected interventions will allow for comparisons of not only the effectiveness of sound therapy, but also potential mechanisms underlying sleep and tinnitus.

Congratulations, Dr. Hébert!

A total of $265,000 has been awarded for the ATA 2021 Innovative Tinnitus Research Grants Program.

I will let you judge by yourself:

http://www.hebertlab.ca/en/publications/

 

[Watasha]

No checks and balances with the ATA. I left a message on phone, they never called me back. They can't even answer the basics. And when their phone messages are only asking for money, that is not good.

Leave a comment on their social media. It amazes me how many people think they are really looking out for us when such a small portion of their contributions go to research.