Tinnitus has been present for a long time. But perhaps it’s new to you, like a loud used car you can’t return. A relentless buzzing or ringing is normally how tinnitus manifests but not always. The sound can be, at times, very loud. Symptoms fluctuate significantly, but here’s the point: if tinnitus is troubling you, you might be looking for some new ways to deal with your symptoms.
In that, you’re in luck because while tinnitus doesn’t yet have an overall cure, there are a few novel therapies that can help you deal with symptoms. Your tongue is even involved in certain of those therapies.
The Most Recent Way to Manage Tinnitus
Perhaps the most novel tinnitus treatment that we’ve seen appears to offer quite a bit of promise, even if it seems a little unusual initially. Both the tongue and the ear are stimulated with this device developed at the Trinity School of Medicine in Dublin. The technical term is bi-modal neuromodulation.
As outlined by the first tests of this device, the results were rather striking. Most individuals received treatments for a duration of twelve weeks or so. Within those 12 months, those same people noted a dramatic reduction in tinnitus symptoms. But until the testing phase is finished it won’t be generally available.
How Can I Get Tinnitus Relief Now?
Naturally, it takes years for technology to go from research and development to patient availability. So perhaps you’re wondering what you can do now to help deal with your tinnitus.
Luckily, there are some newer tinnitus therapy devices available today. And the most common way to handle your tinnitus is a modern hearing aid.
It works like this:
Your hearing aid can provide you with something else to listen to. One reason why tinnitus becomes more noticeable as you lose your hearing is that the ringing is the only thing that stays loud while everything else gets quieter. The volume of the outside world is boosted by hearing aids. That doesn’t lower the volume of your tinnitus, but it could make the ringing less noticeable.
Your hearing aid can mask the noise. A masking device may be the way to go if your hearing loss is mild. A masking device essentially looks like a hearing aid. And masking technology can be combined with modern hearing aids. Your tinnitus symptoms can be masked by sounds emitted by this type of technology. Sometimes this will be a tone, in other cases, it may be some white noise. Whatever will best hide the humming in your ears.
Of course, this is only a starting point. We can show you devices that work best with tinnitus. Give us a call.