If you are one of the 15% of people who suffer from tinnitus and you’ve been told that there’s nothing that can be done about it, I’m here to tell you otherwise.

The saddest part of our job is hearing new patients say, “Well, I saw a doctor about this ten years ago and they said there's nothing I can do, so I've just been living with it ever since.”

We want to tell you right now – your tinnitus matters to us at Highline Audiology & Hearing Aids, and there is a lot that can be done to manage it.

Most hearing professionals and audiologists don't treat tinnitus to the fullest extent possible because they don't specialize in it, and you'll even hear some of them, unfortunately, say that they can't treat it at all.

You might also hear a lot of ear, nose, and throat (ENT) doctors say the same thing, but this is not because it’s true; it’s because they are not aware of the newer tinnitus research.

What Is Tinnitus?

Tinnitus is any sound a person hears that is not caused by an outside stimulus – a phantom sound, some clinicians call it, although it can seem very real.

The sound could be literally anything. Some people hear a ringing, some people hear buzzing. Some people even have what's called musical tinnitus, so they hear the same song over and over and over again. Even hearing voices is technically considered a tinnitus sound because it happens inside your head and is not an external sound.

Tinnitus Causes

For the majority of people, tinnitus is the result of the brain missing sound and needing to make one up. If you have tinnitus, the chances are relatively high that you will also have some degree of hearing loss.

Noise exposure can cause tinnitus, as can head injuries, certain medications, or problems in the inner ear. Bacterial and viral infections can also affect the auditory system to where tinnitus occurs.

How Is Tinnitus Diagnosed?

Tinnitus is diagnosed by doing a tinnitus test. People seeking tinnitus treatment might have had a hearing test in the past and been told they don't have a hearing loss, so their tinnitus can’t be treated; but the testing center likely didn't test all the frequencies, so they might have a hidden hearing loss in a higher frequency.

Highline Audiology and Hearing Aids has high-frequency headphones. This means we can perform high-frequency audiology tests. If you come to us for a tinnitus assessment, you can rest assured that we have the best equipment for your diagnosis.

When Is Tinnitus Clinically Significant?

Tinnitus is considered clinically significant when it’s debilitating – affecting your mental health, relationships, ability to work, and participation in social activities.

Strangely enough, everyone can have some measure of tinnitus. It's more normal than you think and it’s usually not an indicator of something serious.

Spontaneous tinnitus – Getting a baseline reading of your tinnitus is fantastic, but don't be worried about it because spontaneous tinnitus comes on for a few seconds and then goes away on its own. And it doesn’t happen at regular intervals – maybe once every month, once every few months. That's fine. You do not need to worry about that at all.

Daily tinnitus – You only really need to worry about it when it lasts for more than five minutes at a time and it's happening at regular intervals or daily. That’s when you really should have treated this a while ago.

When it’s affecting your emotions negatively – Tinnitus not only affects the auditory system of the brain; it also affects the limbic system of the brain – our fight, flight, or freeze reactions. Tinnitus really can affect your emotions.

• It can increase your anxiety.

• It can increase depression.

• It can also activate a fearful response.

Naturally, your brain is trained to identify threats. This creates an emotional response in the person you can't control. Don't feel guilty about feeling scared. You can't control the way your brain reacts to the sound. Let's just treat it.

What Does Tinnitus Treatment Look Like?

Being told that your tinnitus is untreatable is the saddest thing in the world to chronic sufferers. It brings on even more depression and anxiety than they already had.

But those doctors are wrong! There is always something we can do. Tinnitus treatment doesn't work for everybody. It doesn’t have a 100% success rate. It's not a guaranteed fix. But there is treatment.

• Treating a hearing loss can also treat the tinnitus – When the brain is missing some sound in a specific area of the cochlea, then the brain says, “There should be something here, but there isn't.”

With hearing aids, we are able to put in a prescription that allows us to move these areas with damaged hair cells with the sound that should be there. Then the brain no longer needs to make up the sound.

That helps some people’s tinnitus immensely.

If your hearing loss has never been treated because the right equipment wasn’t used, we can test your hearing with the right equipment and start your hearing treatment right away.

• Tinnitus training therapy (TRT) – I use a modified version of TRT to retrain the brain so it stops focusing on the tinnitus and changes its focus to a newer sound. This pushes the awareness of the tinnitus back and gives your brain some relief. This training is most proven to work out of all the treatment possibilities available to date.

TRT helps some people, and it can even get rid of some people’s tinnitus (but that's rare).

To help you visualize how it works: If you're in a dark room and there's a candle right in the middle of the room, you're staring at that candle. Turn on the lights and yes, the candle flame is still bright, but now it's not the only thing that you have to look at, so it's no longer your main focus and it's not perceived as bright.

What Research Is Being Done to Find Better Tinnitus Relief?

Highline prioritizes staying up to date with tinnitus research so that we know what's new and what research results are saying is best. When promising treatments do become available, hopefully we'll be able to use those as well.

Some new tinnitus treatments are available in the UK, but they are not available here yet. One that we’re particularly interested in is bimodal tinnitus treatment. It combines sound therapy with electrical stimulation of tactile pathways, and it appears to be able to reduce tinnitus symptoms significantly.

In layman’s terms, it’s a “tongue zappy thing” that lights up the brain in two different sections to take that focus away from the tinnitus and retrain the brain.

Is There a Tinnitus Cure?

There is not a cure … yet. There are very effective, proven treatment options, but there is no cure.

Finding the Best Tinnitus Treatment in Washington State

Don't Google it. Don't do WebMD. Go see an expert, especially if you’ve been told in the past that there’s nothing that can be done.

When you book your tinnitus appointment at Highline Audiology and Hearing Aids, we’ll do a thorough tinnitus test, making sure to assess what you’re hearing at all the frequencies most audiologists don’t test for.

We’ll also try a few things right after the test to see what might work and come up with a treatment plan that can help.

Get your tinnitus checked out. Don't delay. We’re looking forward to meeting you and making your life manageable again.