As my GP said now that i have reduced my BP meds and the noise is still there...it cant be medicine related...
This is a logical fallacy. There are processes in biology which are reversible and some which are not. Ototoxicity may be reversible in some cases; in some cases not.
Reversible example: Aspirin "overdose" in animal tinnitus testing:
The NMDA receptor was first validated as a target for the treatment of tinnitus using an animal behavioral model of tinnitus triggered by salicylate, the active substance of aspirin. Salicylate is known to trigger temporary tinnitus when administered in high doses. The animal model demonstrated that local administration of different NMDA antagonists to the inner ear allowed for suppression of salicylate induced tinnitus.
Source: Auris Medical (
www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1601936/000119312514253454/d684505df1.htm)
Cases where ototoxicity is generally not reversible:
Drug induced hearing loss (ototoxicity)
Over 130 approved drugs can cause ototoxicity through direct effect on cochlear biology. There are three main categories of ototoxic drugs:
- Platinum based anti-cancer drugs
- Aminoglycoside antibiotics
- Loop diuretics, primarily used to treat hypertension and oedema
Cancer patients are at greatest risk as they may be prescribed more than one of these groups.
In this case, damage to the cochlea is the direct result of chemical injury to the delicate hair cells and mechanisms that sustain the function of the organ. However, downstream central pathology is likely to be similar to that occurring following noise damage.
Source: Autifony Therapeutics (
www.autifony.com/autifony-hearing-acute.asp)
Your BP medication would probably fall in the 3rd category (loop diuretics). It is - therefore - certainly possible that your doctor caused your tinnitus (at least the argument that "cessation of medication is proof of causation" is invalid). Ototoxicity is serious business and there is a certain percentage of doctors who are simply not up to the mark when it comes to knowledge of medication and side-effects: hypertension should only be treated with medication when all other attempts have failed e.g. work-outs and sports; diet change; weight-loss.
Example of biology where processes are reversible: cholesterol levels i.e. sports and diet change will reduce your marker levels.
Example of biology where processes are irreversible: a person breaking his/her arm by being run over by a car; yes, you guessed it: running the person over again in reverse will - generally - not heal the broken arm (bad joke, I know).
A further note on ototoxicity and nerve damage. We are born with only so many nerve cells. Unlike other cell types (e.g. skin cells), nerve cells do not multiply. Another complication in biology is scar tissue (which prevents healthy tissue to develop in its place). When a nerve is dead, it is gone for good. There are two existing technologies in medicine which can influence that outcome: cold laser therapy and stem cell therapy.
Ototoxicity can be observed on an audiogram (best solution: high frequency test incl. 16 kHz).
Im still stuck on wondering if it was the spinal anesthetic i had in labour maybe what caused this? :-/
My opinion - for what it is worth - is that a spinal anesthetic is only a problem when leakage occurs.
Lastly, if you are not - like most patients - in a position of knowledge to confront your doctor, print this and show it to him/her. In addition, I personally find it somewhat sad that the above knowledge comes from a person with a background in finance rather than a background in medicine. I wonder if a degree in medicine can be acquired via a vending machine these days.
attheedgeofscience
10/JAN/2016.
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