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The Stages of Tinnitus
– How often do you hear the noises?
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| 1. |
Occurs for less
than 1 minute, at least once a week
- still the early stages
- General causes for these symptons are often
stress, muscle tension and a lack of sleep.
Advice:
The most important thing to do in this situation is not to
allow yourself to become more stressed about it. This may
often lead to a worsening of the condition. Analyse your daily
routine, try to reduce your stress factors and relax your
muscle tension.
Possible treatments: Daily meditation
is recommended.
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| 2. |
Occurs for less
than 1 hour, at least once a week
- Acute tinnitus
- Specific causes might be noise trauma (shots, loud music),
a previous illness or abnormal blood pressure.
Advice: This
may be the last chance to treat tinnitus without costly
surgery. At this point it is strongly advised you change
your lifestyle. Aim for less stress, good sleeping patterns,
more relaxation, drinking enough water, and generally
living a balanced lifestyle.
Possible treatments: A daily 30-minute
sound
therapy procedure therapy is highly recommended here.
If immediate measures are taken, such as soft
laser treatment, an acute tinnitus can be treated
within three months time.
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| 3. |
More than 1 hour,
at least once a week
- Subacute tinnitus
- Many attempts at treatments have usually
been undertaken, often with little success
Advice:
At this stage holistic treatment is recommended, which should
be carried out promptly. Once tinnitus become chronic, the
chances of a cure are decreased.
Possible treatments: Soft
laser treatment and meditation
therapy should be carried out at the same time. If you
are having trouble sleeping then the treatment should also
be expanded to include sleep
therapy.
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| 4. |
Constant –
you’ve already suffered for longer than a year
- Chronic tinnitus
- It is possible that you have already lost
the zest for life and hope of recovery
Advice: The chance
of 100% recovery is less at this stage, however, not impossible.
Possible treatments: There are still opportunities
available for the reduction of the tinnitus noise, e.g.
soft
laser treatment. There are new, promising methods available,
primarily for the improvement of the quality of life, such
as meditation
therapy, sleep
therapy and nature sound
masking.
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Understanding
Tinnitus more
Current medical opinion is that tinnitus is the
result of complex workings of several body systems, together producing
the symptons we associate as experiencing tinnitus. An understanding
of the Hearing pathway is useful in understanding how the ear
works.
In short the hearing pathway employs a complex
filtering system, allowing us to “tune-in” to sounds
with meaning and filtering out all the millions of sounds that could
bombard us. We all know that at a party our ears suddenly “tune-in”
to conversations when our name is mentioned, the effect of tinnitus
is worsened by this very mechanism. Once you become aware of the
tinnitus, your filters “tune-in” more and as fustraton
sets in it gets worse. The good news is the filters can be trained
to ignore the signal, known as “habituation”.
What kind of noise do you hear?
- Individualised
forms of therapy are available to mask the specific sound
that you hear. These therapies changes or 'blocks' the perception
of the tinnitus noise.
- When you know your frequency more specific sound
therapy can be supplied for the masking of the tinnitus noise
or more specifically, as a sleep
aid.
| - HEARING TEST
- a
test to establish the frequency your tinnitus
noise. |
Famous sufferers of tinnitus
William
Shatner
Van Gogh
Sting
Pete Townsend
Barbara Streisland
Steve Martin
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