Pulsatile Tinnitus — Now on Tinnitus Talk

[Fish]

I didn't mention it to anybody but Karen so far, maybe someone will have any idea what is going on and what could I do.

I've been experiencing some very unusual symptom for few years before my "normal" tinnitus started. When I perform certain actions, I hear a loud, roaring sound that lasts for 2-3 seconds in my right ear. It happens most often when I stretch myself, yawn, or reach for something on the ground. Sometimes it happens while I'm talking. I can speak normally but right after I finish the sentence I hear this "whooosh" in my right ear.

It was never really a problem to me and I didn't pay much attention to it but some time ago I got pulsatile tinnitus that would appear in the late evening and disappear in the morning the next day. It started on 23rd of december and resolved itself somewhere mid-january.​

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Now it's back, 3rd day in a row I can clearly hear a whooshing, rhythmic sound in my right ear. It's not as severe as the first time it appeared but it still bothers me a bit. It comes around at 11:00 PM and when I wake up in the morning it's gone completely.​

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The problem is, the ENT doctor I told about my symptoms just raised an eyebrow and wasn't really sure what to do with me.​

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[Karen]

Hi, Fish,
I'm sorry you're having the pulsatile tinnitus symptoms again. Have you experienced any undue pressure or anxiety over the past 3 days that could have caused this to begin again? There are so many possible causes for pulsatile tinnitus that it's difficult to say what is going on. Have you tried pressing on the carotid artery on that side of your neck when the whooshing occurs, to see if that relieves the sound?

I'm wondering if you really have the pulsating all day long, and are only aware of it at night,when things are quiet?

Also, I remember that you have had some back problems. Sometimes this condition can be related to that; perhaps if it doesn't go away, you could return to that doctor and tell him of your new symptoms?

Will be interested to hear what others have to say about Fish's condition.

 

[Fish]

Hey there Karen.

I didn't have it yesterday anymore *crosses fingers*

The pulsating was nowhere as severe as after Christmas, it lasted for few minutes then went away. Only in the late evening and only in the right ear. I have tried pressing my head, jaw and neck in various places but nothing seems to have any effect on the pulsating. Sometimes I feel it gets a bit worse when I bend down to pick up something off the floor. I feel it might be spine-related after all.

I am 100% sure the pulsating is not present throughout the day, I would definitely have heard it

Those symptoms are so weird! I guess I gotta go back to my doctor...

 

[Markku]

Weird, would seem logical there is something going on that could be fixed / helped (e.g. by avoiding some movements or something?)

I do sympathize with the doctors too, a cause for a symptom like this must be frigging hard to figure out. But they should try and do everything they can, run all the tests there are (MRI etc?).

Sometimes when I read "Whooshers" (whooshers.com), it's mind-numbing how many causes for pulsatile tinnitus there seem to be. Some of them very curable!

I'm interested what your doctor will try next!

 

[Fish]

You are right Markku, I was thinking the same thing - that there has to be a physical cause for it and it could be "seen" by a doctor for example if he looked what happens with my ear drum while I'm yawning or something.

He actually wanted me to do an MRI but the pulsating was completely gone two weeks before the test and I decided there's no need to do it anymore, silly me

Funny thing I realized is I didn't hear nor even think about my "regular" tinnitus for few days now, until today.

 

[Karen]

Hi, Fish,
I'm glad your pulsating was gone as of yesterday, and I hope it won't return. It may be spine-related, as you say, especially since you're not able to push on any area when the pulsating is going on and have it subside. If it does come back, an MRI might be a good idea. As Markku says, there are so many possible causes for pulsating tinnitus, it is hard to say what might be causing yours to come and go like that.

Mine is different. It doesn't come and go, it's always there, 24/7. But, like you, I cannot push on my carotid artery and have it subside. I've tried pushing on various areas around my jaw and neck, and nothing makes it change at all! Very strange.

I hope you continue to be pulsating-free. That is indeed good news!

 

[Fish]

Hello again,

thank you for your replies, thank you Karen for your continued support! Pulsating tinnitus didn't come back anymore.

I visited a different ENT doctor today and described him my symptoms. He attempted to see with an otoscope what happens inside my ear when I produce this "rumbling" sound. I'm not sure if I translated this name properly but he said my "tensor tympani" muscle contracts itself involuntarily causing the roaring. Pulsating tinnitus was possibly caused by it, tensor tympani muscle contracting itself in the rhythm of my heartbeat for some reason.

It could be stress, tmj-related, neck etc. Well, I really need this MRI I guess...

I realized I've become much more sensitive to anything ear-related since my "normal" tinnitus started... I lived with this rumbling sound for a long time and never paid much attention to it before

 

[Karen]

Fish,
I am so glad for you that the pulsating has gone away! That's good news. And I looked up tensor tympani muscle; it looks like the tensor tympani can cause a host of otologic problems. Maybe it is stress-related; that makes sense.

Good luck on finding out what is causing the rumbling noise. Please keep me updated on what your doctor finds out!

 

[James]

Maybe, this is an old thread. It's an interest to me. I have Pulsing Tinnitus.

Anyone find a connection too high blood pressure, and or hyperthyroidism, and or hypertension causing the pulsing? Perhaps someones has mentioned this. I'm just not sure of the answer.

I mentioned to my GP my thyroid medication might be too much for me, as I age, with my TSH at .37, the doctor didn't think much of that. She told me to skip a dose a week. No change yet.

 

[HandsOnmyfaceOverbearing]

Hey guys,

I have been looking at these forums and i am extremely extremely glad that people are experiencing similar accounts. I am new and am really excited to have signed up. The reason i am posting today is i have been doing a lot of research today and there is one thing i have not seen in other symptoms. You know for the most part people with pulsatile tinnitus experience around the same thing. And i've been seeing that, or a pattern, within the feeling of Pulsatile Tinnitus. I understand that Pulsatile Tinnitus is a symptom of usually something much larger as i have been reading on whooshers.com.

I will give a little history. I started experiencing this back in june of 2012. I have been taking a medication called Depakote ER and anti-depressants which is Zoloft. I have never experienced this problem before in my life and i noticed that it began as i went off of these medications. Now.. everytime i should say. I had some issues where i quit taking each of those medications and i noticed the Pulsatile Tinnitus pretty much immediately when i went off of those medications. And it goes away when i get back on them. One thing that occurs when I have my PT is whooshing in both ears in coordinance with my heartbeat. Now when this is happening, the strange thing is, that there is a flutter throughout my entire body. In rhythm with my heartbeat and PT.

Not only is there a flutter but there is also an annoying tingling sensation that goes down my arms into my hands and fingers and down my whole body into my legs and toes. This is annoying. Extremely annoying. It feels like extreme anxiety and i dont know if that is produced by me because of the feeling itself but my hands also shake for quite awhile. I notice this very badly in the morning times. it gets better but i can still feel it throughout the day. I have a Dr appointment coming up on the 9th which is a couple days for medications purposes and ill be going back on them and i will discuss this with him as well but I'm mainly wondering if anyone experienced this similarly and what became of it? Thanks so much for even reading this.

 

[Karen]

Hi, HOMFO, and welcome!

I've just read your post with great interest, since I have pulsating tinnitus, too.

Three years ago, my doctor said my blood pressure was too high, and insisted (very strongly!) that I start taking blood pressure medicine. I was very reluctant to take it, but finally decided to give it a try. Well, from day one, I had some very frightening side effects from the drug. I finally got myself off it, but within about a week after I got off the drug, the pulsating started. I really believe it was the trauma of the medicine itself, and the process of getting off the medicine, that caused my pulsating to begin. It kind of validates my suspicions that you also experienced the pulsating after getting off two drugs.

I'm no longer on blood pressure meds, and am controlling my blood pressure with exercise and natural supplements. It's working well, but I still have pulsating tinnitus. I've had several tests (CT scan, carotid Doppler, MRI/MRA),but so far no cause has turned up.

For a long time, I had pulsating not just in my ear, but when I tried to sleep, I felt it all through my body. My hands used to shake, and sometimes I would shake all over. It is now three years later, and I have finally gotten rid of the shakiness, which makes it easier to sleep again. What did I do? Well, I'm not sure, but I think time has helped, and the fact that I've been taking magnesium chloride every day for at least a year now. That seems to help calm things down.

I'll be interested to hear what your doctor has to say. I hope you'll update us after you've seen him.

 

[Ellen]

Karen, a new acquaintance told me her pulsatile T probably arise after years of being nervous and tense on her job. I wonder if there is a correlation with those born with nervous disposition and pulsatile T. If nothing could be found on the scans, could it be somewhere along the other portions of the nervous system?

 

[HandsOnmyfaceOverbearing]

Thanks for some replies! Yay. Thats interesting you bringing up those with nervousness or anxiety. I am a huge nervous and anxious person that tried forever to self medicate that. I wonder of those with nervousness or anxiety show a predisposition to T. That's interesting. Alit of people here or have anxiety? I know it strays a bit but...

 

[Karen]

Hi, Ellen and HOMFO,
I feel that there is a correlation between getting off some drugs, such as benzo's, blood pressure drugs, or anti-anxiety drugs, and pulsatile tinnitus. It may have something to do with the central nervous system (or brain) that sets off this reaction. That's only my theory.

And, yes, it is possible that people who have a tendency toward nervousness or anxiety could be more prone to tinnitus. Tinnitus also is a cause of anxiety in many people.

However, many people who have pulsatile tinnitus have an actual, physical reason for it, which must be ruled out first. That's why visiting a doctor and testing is recommended in most cases of PT.

 

[HandsOnmyfaceOverbearing]

So apparently my pulsatile tinnitus was caused by a drug reaction after going well off of the drugs. So I suppose this was a symptom of withdrawal. Of course my doctor did not take it seriously at all. He took it quite lightly. Shrugged it off and said it was just because I was in off my meds. I guess that could be it. Just as it always has my physical and emotional state went back to normal as my tinnitus subsided.

Interesting how much it affects your life and then a doc can throw all of your stress down the pipe with such ignorance. Whether or not his guided words put me at ease or his utter lack of acknowledgement. Maybe I'll never know. Or maybe I will find a doc who cares to look a little bit into it. Or maybe he's right. Anyhow its gone.

 

[Karen]

I'm glad to hear it's gone; that is good news! I'm still struggling with mine, because I am determined NOT to go back on blood pressure drugs. I took more than one type, and they all had horrendous side effects for me. So, for me, the pulsating remains.

Thanks for sharing your experience with drugs and pulsating tinnitus, HOMFO. That pretty much validates what I had thought. I hope it stays away for you!

 

[Sunnyjoy]

Thanks for some replies! Yay. Thats interesting you bringing up those with nervousness or anxiety. I am a huge nervous and anxious person that tried forever to self medicate that. I wonder of those with nervousness or anxiety show a predisposition to T. That's interesting. Alit of people here or have anxiety? I know it strays a bit but...

I apologize, HOMFO and Karen, if I'm messing up the order here. This is my first post and I'm having a little trouble figuring out how to do it. I wanted to respond to your question about nervousness/anxiety, since I'm someone who is tense most of the time. I'm now experiencing the pulsating or pulsatile tinnitis and it's pretty frightening. For someone like me, who gets very anxious when I don't know why something is happening, a group of folks like all of you providing information is a wonderful gift. I imagine there are many of us with the same nervous constitution going through this. It's wonderful we can support and help each other, and I'm grateful.

Now I'm going to try to figure out how to post my own message in the right place and forum!

 

[Karen]

Hi, Sunnyjoy, and welcome! To post a new thread, go to the forum category that you want to post under, and click on it. Go to the bottom of the page, and it will say "Post New Thread".

We're glad you joined us. I have pulsatile tinnitus, too. Please tell us how yours happened. Did it occur suddenly, and do you have any idea what might have triggered it?

I, and others, certainly understand what you're going through right now. It's hard to concentrate, and very difficult to sleep, with the pulsating going on. I'm sure all of us with this condition feel frightened and anxious at first. We're all here to support one another!

 

[Joe Lin]

My pulsatile tinnitus started on the same day I caught a cold (last Friday). The cold was better after 2-3 days but the pulsing sound has persisted. It sounds like someone is breathing down my neck and I can almost feel a slight vibration as it happens. During the day, the sound is not perceptible, but if I turn off ambient sounds and am sleeping in a quiet room, it gets annoyingly frustrating. I've definitely lost sleep over this.

I've been to a doctor and taken a hearing test from an audiologist and everything checked out completely normal.

For those who have experienced it, what was it like? How did it happen and did it go away?

 

[Robert Fahey]

The tingling sounds like a well-known phenomenon called a brain "zap," linked to withdrawal from antidepressants, especially if done too quickly. You say it happens when you're tapering off, right?

 

[Simon]

hi.i need help badly.for the past 2 weeks i have had a ear infection and along with that a pulsating sound in my infected ear.doctor prescribed me antibiotics and ear drops and the pain went away and left behind a pulsating sound in my ear.its fine during the day but at night its really hard to sleep and its driving me insane.i know tinnitus doesnt have a cure but i read somewhere that pulsating tinnitus is caused by a medical condition which is most likely treatable.im hoping that my left ear will stop pulsating soon.i dont know what i will do if it doesn't. i have mild tinnitus but it doesn't really bother me.it usually clears up after a while in quite places..i went to the eye and ear hospital 2 days ago and they said the infection hasn't cleared up yet so he gave me antibiotics.can any of you people share your experiences with this.thank you.

 

[Karen]

Hi, Simon, and welcome!

I've had pulsatile tinnitus for three years now. Mine started as a result of taking blood pressure drugs. I've been off the blood pressure drugs now for almost three years, but the pulsating remains. I've had various tests, including a CT scan, and MRI/MRA, and Doppler of carotid arteries, but they found nothing that might be causing my pulsating.

Like you, I had mild tinnitus (not pulsating) before this started, but it was not bothersome. The bad news is that my pulsating is still there, but the good news is that it has gotten less severe with time.

If you still have an ear infection, it is possible that the pulsating will subside after the infection clears up. What type of antibiotic are you currently taking? Did you know that some antibiotics are ototoxic (can harm the ears)? Elsewhere on this site, (use the Search function) you'll find a list of ototoxic drugs. We can help you if you are unable to find it. If you find that the antibiotic is ototoxic, you might want to ask your doctor for a different antibiotic.

After your ear infection clears up, if you still have the pulsating, you might want to go back to your doctor for additional testing. Yes, it is true that pulsating tinnitus is curable if a cause can be found. However, some of us are unable to find a cause. For more information about pulsatile tinnitus, you might want to check out whooshers.com. There, you'll find lots of information about pulsatile tinnitus, and stories of people who have been cured.

I wish you the best, and hope that yours clears up. If it doesn't, I can share supplements you might want to try and other ways to cope. You might try using background sounds at night to help you sleep. Are you using any type of sleep aid?

 

[Robert Fahey]

Breathing/snoring
Swallowing
Chewing
Bloodflow

These are all audible bodily rhythms. In the worst case, if the pulsation stays with you, it will just join the soundtrack and you won't give it another thought. Karen and I can attest. Meanwhile, treat the anxiety if it's disrupting your sleep.

 

[stab]

Hi,

I'm a 27 years old male, fairly skinny and generally healthy.

For about 3 years (maybe longer) I have pulsatile tinnitus. I hear a high pitched whooshing sound in my head (mostly in right ear) on the rythm of the heart beat. I'm not sure if it got a bit louder, but lately I am noticing it more again.

The strange thing is, is that it changes with the position I'm in. I don't hear it at all while lying down for instance. When I'm standing straight I can hear it a bit, but when I turn my head sideways it almost disappears. When I sit I can hear it the loudest, but again, when I look up or sideways it dissappears. When I look down, the pitch changes (lower).

It's not really the sound bothering me (it's not very loud and I mostly don't hear it throughout the day), but it's that I'm scared that something serious is causing it.

I went 2 times to the doc (GP) for it. 1 checked my blood pressure and ruled that one out. The other looked at my ears and said my eardrums are slightly retracted inwards. She said that this might be the cause and that many people are hearing these sounds...

Now 2 years later, I'm not so sure of that. Informative websites say it is is pretty rare (3% of tinnitus cases) and can be caused by serious ilnesses. My question is, what do you think?
Why does the loudness / pitch change with different positions? Does that mean high cholestorol / tumors can be ruled out?
Does the blood flow to your brain changes with these positions and how could that affect the pulsating tinnitus?

Any help or insight is helpful and very welcome.
Thanks for your time.

 

[Karen]

Hi, Stab, and welcome!

I have pulsatile tinnitus, too, in my right ear. I've had it for a little over three years, like you. Yes, it can fluctuate depending on the movement of your body. Mine used to make a crashing sound when I bent over, or had to lift anything heavy. It is calmer now, so I haven't had that experience lately.

Have you only been to a GP for this condition? Perhaps you could try going to a different type of doctor to be checked out, just to rule out anything that might be a problem. A neurotologist is a specialist in the nervous system and how it affects the ears. He/she might be able to help you, and perhaps have you tested. I've had an MRI/MRA and a CT scan, plus a Doppler of my carotid arteries. They were not able to find anything; although I don't know what is causing my PT, I at least have some peace of mind that there is nothing serious, such as an aneurysm, that might need attention.

There are many possible causes for pulsatile tinnitus, so you might want to be checked out, to be sure all is well.

Best wishes,
Karen

 

[stab]

Thanks Karen! And good luck with your tinnitus. Good to hear yours has no serious cause.

I might go to the hospital to rule out some things later, but I'm kinda scared for what might come out

It doesn't 'seem' serious. I'm not even sure about how long I have it. I might have had it already when I was a child. Just trying to figure out now what I can conclude myself from the symptoms and what I can rule out.

Hope somebody can help me with that whilst reading my 1st post.

 

[Karen]

Hi, Stab! I'm glad to hear that you may go to the hospital to rule out any problems. Good luck, and I'd like to hear the outcome of your tests.

If you've had it for a long time, I think that's a good sign that it is nothing serious. Also, you are young, so that's another point in your favor. Doctors don't know much about this mysterious condition, and most people I've talked to who have it say it just started one day, out of the blue. That's what happened to me, too. However, mine started after I had begun taking blood pressure medicine, then tried to get myself off it. I also got myself off caffeine around the same time. I think abrupt changes to the body, if your ear is already sensitive, could have something to do with it. Did you already have problems with your right ear BEFORE this started?

Anyway, I wish you well, and hope you can find some answers!

 

[Kellster]

Same here! But if I look left it triple increases to my pulse asking with a whoosh.looking right makes it quieter.try bending chin to chest.momentarily silences it! It's like heaven

 

[Karen]

Kell,

You're lucky to have found something that gives you a few minutes of silence! When I put my chin to my chest, there is no change; I still hear the same pulsating.

 

[stab]

Hi all,

For years I have pulsatile tinnitus. It's not very loud and very high pitched, almost like a mosquito which flyes closeby and then further. The sound syncs with my heart beat.

Also, it completely disappears when I lie down flat. When I stand straight, it becomes almost inaudible. When I twist my neck and look sideways, it's inaudible.
When I sit / stand while looking (slightly) downwards, I hear it. Not even does the volume changes when tilting my neck, the pitch also changes...

Like I said its not very loud and can only hear it in quiet times. Luckily it disappears when lying down flat so it doesn't bother me when I try to sleep.

I just want to know if it's something dangerous or not. What could these signs mean? Is it a positive thing that the sound is high pitched? Is it a good sign that it dissappears when I have my neck straight? Could we ourselves from this already rule out tumors and aneurysms for example?

I'm sure many of you have experience with what medical experts have shared to you. What do you guys think when you read this?