Tinnitus: Possible Causes

Tinnitus or "ear ringing" is a condition affecting around 15 percent of the general public, although it is believed to be quite underestimated.

People over a certain age, along with some specific categories of profession, are more exposed to it than others: These include musicians, construction workers, and last but not least, war veterans.

It usually starts out as a ringing or buzzing monotone, but also a hissing or cricket sound might be heard. Problem is, only you seem to hear it and are bothered by, while the place you are in is completely quiet and people around you are acting as if nothing strange was happening. This is because what you are hearing has nothing to do with sound or with your ears, but rather, with your brain: Which is why it is also referred to as "phantom sound".

In fact, our brain is made to receive and elaborate a certain amount of sounds from the environment on a daily basis.

If our hearing cells are damaged or die, they don't grow back, leaving some sort of a gap in the perceptive spectrum.

When our hearing abilities decrease, either due to age or trauma, the brain starts an adaptive mechanism where it works as an amplifier in order to get the quantity of information it was used to. It tries to fill in that gap, so to speak.

The result of this tuning-in process is that ringing sound which one may hear the morning after a night at the club or at a rock concert, and that usually fades away in a few hours time.

For some unlucky ones though, the sound will stay, causing them great distress and misery.

Tinnitus is in fact associated with other conditions such as insomnia, depression and even higher suicide risk.

Because hearing impairment is usually caused by exposing oneself to loud repetitive noises over a period of time, you might want to start by turning down the volume of your radio or tv a little, and cutting down on those heavy metal concerts and techno raves you used to go to at the weekends.

A simple ear infection or, in the worst case scenario, even a tumour, may also be cause to that annoying sound.

Therefore it is of great importance, when these symptoms start showing up, to immediately go see a specialist, preferably an audiologist, who will test your hearing ability as the first thing, to be able to cross out any other more worrisome problem.

Not to forget that some drugs and medicines might also play a role in this, namely some of those used in chemotherapy treatments.

Although there seems to be no wholly recognized cure for tinnitus, there are several ways to alleviate its intensity and therefore the stress it causes.

This is what our ultimate goal needs to be, rather than any miraculous treatment that will most certainly prove to be a scam: To improve the patient's quality of life, whether it be with the help of more technological aids, such as apps or sound machines, or just with simple stress reduction techniques.