Tinnitus

[AdamG]

Have you had covid-19? Perhaps asymptomatically? Read link in my previous post: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/covid-19-hearing-loss.21648/

I was just typing the same info. Has been found to be symptomatic with COVID-19. So with treatment and time it may subside,

 

[red_kk]

There are many potential causes for tinnitus, from stress or medications to infections and blood vessel disorders and so on. It is actually a rather long list.

I have tinnitus in my right ear when I think about it - like now, otherwise it goes away! Best is to see a good specialist and take their advise. Mine was most alleviated by rinsing my sinuses regularly with a mild alkaline solution because it was caused by a low-level sinus infection (the rinse was to fix the persistent infection, coincidentally it improved the tinitus!). Good luck! Best is to stay calm and follow the best medical advise.

I've always had issues with sinuses since childhood. my doctor also said my tonsils have enlarged so could be a connection there. will know for sure this friday. I've started rinsing today as you suggested, it can't hurt i'm able to breathe better

 

[red_kk]

To the OP, unless you listened to really loud music often (headphones) the cause is probably something else so let's hope a doctor can help you. But if you develop Tinnitus from loud sounds the damage to your ears is irreparable and you just have to learn to live with it.

Pretty positive i've never heard to music that loud not in last 10yrs, every day i listen to new speakers it is between 65 to 70dB. I'll get on top of this issue, there has to be a reason, one thing I won't do is accept it the way it is and habituate. There has to be some kind of cure based on science.

 

[red_kk]

There is a preconscious filter in hearing that takes out noise and makes predictions what a sound is supposed to be. Tinnitus is a failure of this system, so that erroneous signals are not filtered out as noise but let through as conscious perception.

There are some cases where careful listening in silence or trying to recognize sounds among much noise teaches the filter to be more lenient, so people get a higher risk of tinnitus. I suppose some tinnitus therapies are based on teaching the filter to be stricter, by listening to noise shaped in a particular way, for example.

One of the things i'm wondering if did I it for myself. I was really looking for a hum in my speakers from listening position caused by a ground loop issue then I started hearing this high frequency tone. For a few days I went crazy and thought something electrical was wrong in the house. May be I've always had it and hearing it only now.

 

[red_kk]

Like all phenomena that we are aware of tinnitus presents itself in consciousness. A well trained clinical audiologist with tinnitus retraining skills can’t usually make the stimulus go away but there are evidenced based practices to reduce or eliminate the psychological and emotional effects. Have you been assessed by an audiologist?

I have an appointment with Audiologist followed by an ENT this Friday. I'll post the findings here.

 

[rdenney]

Pretty positive i've never heard to music that loud not in last 10yrs, every day i listen to new speakers it is between 65 to 70dB. I'll get on top of this issue, there has to be a reason, one thing I won't do is accept it the way it is and habituate. There has to be some kind of cure based on science.

Hearing loss is cumulative--listening loud 20 years ago might just now be showing signs.

I have tinnitus in my left ear for a while, and increasingly in my right ear. I get a tea-kettle whistle, something in the 11-12 KHz range overlaying some hiss. I hear a bit of pulsing when I focus on it, in time with my heartbeat.

But I will say that though there are causes, tinnitus can be and usually is a response to hearing loss. Management rather than cure may be the only option.

Rick "who needs to schedule another visit to the audiologist" Denney

 

[bo_knows]

I hope this post belongs here if not I apologize in advance.

I recently developed Tinnitus with constant high frequency ringing in both ears. Cause unknown and definitely not because of listening at high volumes. I always listened music <70 dB SPL measured with iPhone app.
As fate would have it this happened just when I purchased my new KEF R11s and setup my full system. (R11, X4700H, Parasound A31)
I only got to enjoy it for a week or so and then started hearing the hum/ringing. Initially I thought it was my speakers humming but then i disconnected power
supply to the house and still heard it. Now i can hear it everywhere and all the time.

I'm curious if I got it because I started listening to different music critically as I was trying to evaluate the speakers and different electronics like AVR and Amplifiers.

If anyone has similar experiences please let me know and any possible cures. I'm clearly very depressed about this so any advice or positive thoughts will help.

Hi red_kk,

I'm experiencing the same thing as you. No humming but the hi-frequency pitch at all times in both ears.

Pretty positive i've never heard to music that loud not in last 10yrs, every day i listen to new speakers it is between 65 to 70dB. I'll get on top of this issue, there has to be a reason, one thing I won't do is accept it the way it is and habituate. There has to be some kind of cure based on science.

Good luck and please keep us posted. I'm experiencing the same thing in both ears. In my case, it's a constant high pitch noise (10-14Khz).
I've been listening to KEF R500 for 5 years and really notice this high pitch noise in my ears for the past 6 months or so. Due to my daily duties, I can only listen once or twice a week for an hour or so but watching Netflix/Amazon prime on a nightly basis. When listening to music, I tried to keep the average SPL at 85db (C weighted). Like many others here, I've attended rock concerts and disco clubs when I was younger and at one point had a "hi-end" system where I listen to the Dynaudio Contour speakers at higher SPL than what I'm listening to now. I felt that I needed really to push Dynaudio boxes before they started to sound their best. I'm sure this didn't help my hearing. Chronic sinus infection is a norm for me and I don't even treat it any longer. I do neti pot rinsing from time to time but it didn't resolve my tinnitus. I think my age (over fifty) is also a contributing factor. For now, I'm trying to ignore it.

 

[Melvinne]

Look at the upside, there is no reason to spend major $ on gear when you have tinnitus. Things like "lower noise floor" and "black backgrounds" mean nothing to you so why waste your money on them!

 

[Thomas savage]

I have something odd , when the extractor fan in my bathroom or indeed in anyones bathroom is active and I'm out of that room but can hear it I get a pulsing in my left ear . Some sort of pressure distortion, quite unpleasant and not noticeable under any other circumstances.

 

[rdenney]

Look at the upside, there is no reason to spend major $ on gear when you have tinnitus. Things like "lower noise floor" and "black backgrounds" mean nothing to you so why waste your money on them!

I could not disagree more. I have tinnitus but I simply listen through it. There are times when my left ear is distorted in addition to the ringing, but the distortion from a system may or may not sound the same and I can still enjoy a good-sounding system.

Perhaps I cannot distinguish some subtleties, but then I'm of the opinion that many people who claim to hear subtleties actually cannot when subjected to controlled testing (and, more frequently than we are willing to admit, when they are simply being honest), and those who do have learned to distinguish artifacts that may or may not be important to music reproduction. I can still tell the difference between systems that make instruments sound like themselves, and those that don't, because my frame of reference is live music and I listen to that through tinnitus, too.

And the tinnitus for me is a specific set of frequencies (or at least within a range) which are higher than most musical content.

I cannot hear anything above abut 12 or 13 KHz, so being loud in the top half of the top octave is not something I care about. But that is not because of tinnitus (though the loss and the ringing may be physiologically related).

Rick "preferences are about controlled comparisons, and the tinnitus for me is a constant" Denney

 

[111db]

I trace my tinnitus (mostly right ear, dog whistle variety) to an event in my young adulthood when I was up on an extension ladder trying to aim a PA speaker and my partner walked in and obliviously pushed up the fader on an open mic. Feedback nearly blasted me off the ladder. Ringing and hearing loss subsided after a few days, but came back over a few decades. I've also had ruptures of both eardrums due to childhood and adult otitis media episodes. BUT... despite tinnitus and moderate hearing loss I am still able to enjoy recorded music more than ever thanks to my personal best DIY system and excellent listening room acoustics---and the brain's amazing ability to compensate. All is not lost.

 

[red_kk]

I trace my tinnitus (mostly right ear, dog whistle variety) to an event in my young adulthood when I was up on an extension ladder trying to aim a PA speaker and my partner walked in and obliviously pushed up the fader on an open mic. Feedback nearly blasted me off the ladder. Ringing and hearing loss subsided after a few days, but came back over a few decades. I've also had ruptures of both eardrums due to childhood and adult otitis media episodes. BUT... despite tinnitus and moderate hearing loss I am still able to enjoy recorded music more than ever thanks to my personal best DIY system and excellent listening room acoustics---and the brain's amazing ability to compensate. All is not lost.

Thanks for the encouraging words. This was one of my worries if i'll ever be able to enjoy music in future. in my case i can't really trace back to any event in life where I had any temporary Tinnitus from loud music.

 

[vibess]

I think I have mild case of tinnitus in my left ear, a low frequent noise that I don't notice most if the time, only when its quiet or i listen for it. Also, with headphones when I crank the volume up a bit I sometimes get distortion in my right ear. Not always, feels a bit random, and sometimes It doesn't have to be very loud to occur. Maybe it's related to certain frequencies or just a "tired" ear. I don't know.
Maybe i'm loosing reference to what is loud and not, especially with headphones.

 

[Chrispy]

I've got a touch of it now, but when well rested I can forget about it here and there. Slept poorly last night and its fairly strong. Doesn't stop me from much audio enjoyment....having something to listen to helps distract me, too. When I first got it it was going to sleep that drove me nuts....used white noise for a while while I got accustomed to it. I'd hate if it gets worse, but with both my younger brother and sister having issues with it and longer than I have (and neither abused their hearing nearly as much as I did)....I'm good with it for now. Now, if I actually go deaf like my dad did, that would be an audio problem....

 

[bo_knows]

Thanks for the encouraging words. This was one of my worries if i'll ever be able to enjoy music in future. in my case i can't really trace back to any event in life where I had any temporary Tinnitus from loud music.

I struggled also with the right ear fatigue during the listening sessions and had to make my sidewall treatment more absorbing.
My room is not large (13.5Wx14.5Lx10H) but it's heavily treated with the room's acoustic elements. Sometimes, my ear will ring for a few seconds later on in the day. I'm not sure how much KEF R500 is responsible for it but the FR is only a few dB down at 20Khz in my MLP.
I sit 8.1 feet from the tweeters and speakers are toed in so I can see some inner sidewall of the pannels. They sound very bright if they are aimed straight at my ears. Not sure if this ear fatigue has any correlation with tinnitus.
Below is the smooth-out (psychoacoustic filter) FR of KEF R500 in my listening room without any EQ or DSP corrections.

 

[Destination: Moon]

Lipoflavinoids have shown some positive results but takes a few months to manifest change

 

[rdenney]

I struggled also with the right ear fatigue during the listening sessions and had to make my sidewall treatment more absorbing.
My room is not large (13.5Wx14.5Lx10H) but it's heavily treated with the room's acoustic elements. Sometimes, my ear will ring for a few seconds later on in the day. I'm not sure how much KEF R500 is responsible for it but the FR is only a few dB down at 20Khz in my MLP.
I sit 8.1 feet from the tweeters and speakers are toed in so I can see some inner sidewall of the pannels. They sound very bright if they are aimed straight at my ears. Not sure if this ear fatigue has any correlation with tinnitus.
Below is the smooth-out (psychoacoustic filter) FR of KEF R500 in my listening room without any EQ or DSP corrections.

View attachment 120125

Interesting to compare that with my most recent REW scan:

I feel as though if my response was a bit less in the 4 Khz vicinity, the overall spectral tilt would look a bit more like an in-room prediction. But I don't think I get much in the way of sharply off-axis early reflections, which are usually what pull the "in-room" curve down a bit. I don't feel like the speakers sound bright at all, but that may be dark hearing on my part. The Redhead doesn't complain, though, and neither does the cat.

(The bumpiness in the left channel at 700ish seems to resist correction, so I'm dealing with a room mode despite the rather high frequency. That's on the exploration list for the future.)

But even with the rolled off higher frequencies, playing music loudly will excite my tinnitus for a while.

Rick "no correction in this chart above 300 Hz" Denney

 

[Soniclife]

Lipoflavinoids have shown some positive results but takes a few months to manifest change

Can you link a study please. My very quick Google didn't find supporting evidence, just things about low quality studies that were inconclusive.

 

[Destination: Moon]

Dammit Jim, I'm a doctor, not an encyclopedia! .....

 

[mkt]

Ugh. "The steakhouse founder, who has died at 65, struggled with crippling ringing in his ears"
https://www.wsj.com/articles/texas-...rmented-by-covid-19-complications-11616590563