Not Sure About My Next Steps

[Sean Foley]

Hi all!
I've had some low-level ringing in my ears for a while, perhaps a year. It was only irritating when I was pretty drunk, so I didn't think about it much.

That was until a week ago. I had an allergic reaction to dust when cleaning my room, which stuffed up my sinuses for several days. I still have pressure in my ears, and I have a constant, unending ringing in my ears. It's driving me nuts.

Are allergies a trigger for tinnitus? Is this likely to go away? Could they be unrelated? I didn't have any major changes in diet, lifestyle, or medicines around the time this started; it really came out of the blue. The only medicine I'm taking is Vitamin D.
Thanks in advance

 

[Aaron44126]

Allergies can indeed exacerbate tinnitus. It is likely to persist for a while (days/weeks) as the inflammation from the reaction clears up, but it should get better.

 

[Sean Foley]

Thank you very much for replying. This has been causing me some anxiety.
I think this is a wakeup call, though. If the allergies are only exacerbating tinnitus I already have, I should start working on treating it.
I've been reading around these forums a bit, but I'm unclear; what kind of doctor should I go to for an initial look at potential tinnitus? I've already talked to my GP, and she said my ears looked perfectly fine.

 

[Aaron44126]

The first step is the GP who can check for obvious things (outer ear infection, too much wax). You should visit an audiologist and have your hearing checked next. Hearing loss is the most common cause for tinnitus (but there are many other possible causes), aside from possibly sound trauma (hearing damage caused by a fire alarm, loud concert/club, using headphones with the volume cranked up too much, or something like that). If hearing loss is the cause, it can be corrected with hearing aids in this case. If your hearing comes back fine, you will need to visit an ENT (ear/nose/throat) doctor, who can do a more detailed check of your ear and order CT or MRI scans if necessary. ENTs usually have a long wait time. Ask to be put on the cancellation wait list and maybe you can get in sooner.

Really though, in many cases there isn't much that can be done besides wait. Time helps a lot. It seems like for many people, it diminishes somewhat over the first few months (even if it may not totally go away). You may not believe it now, but you can get used to it, and it will stop causing you so much grief. I didn't believe that I could ever get used to it when mine started... But I did over the course of a few months, albeit, it settled down from it's initial horrible state to something "softer" and that also helped.

If you have trouble sleeping or concentrating, look into sound enrichment. Find something pleasant to listen to, to help keep your mind off of the tinnitus. Nature sounds (running water, birds, crickets) seem to work well. There are lots of videos on YouTube if you just search "tinnitus". I use the White Noise app from TMSoft (www.tmsoft.com), available on pretty much all platforms, which has a selection of sounds that you can mix together.

Good luck and I hope that you notice it getting better soon.