Tinnitus has been around for a long time. But maybe it’s new to you, like a loud used car you can’t take back. A relentless ringing or buzzing is normally how tinnitus is experienced but not always. The sound can be, at times, really loud. However tinnitus manifests for you, this point is most likely true: you are most likely looking for new ways of dealing with your tinnitus if it’s something that’s bothering you.
The good news is that new therapies and treatments are being formulated that aren’t cures for tinnitus but can help you manage it. Your tongue is even involved in certain of those therapies.
The Newest Way to Handle Tinnitus
Perhaps the newest tinnitus treatment to hit our radar does indeed offer quite a bit of potential, even if it sounds a little strange initially. Both the tongue and the ear are stimulated with this device designed at the Trinity School of Medicine in Dublin. Bi-modal neurostimulation is the technical term for this approach.
Based on the first tests of this device, the results were pretty striking. Most individuals underwent treatments for twelve weeks or so. Those same people noted a significant decrease in their tinnitus symptoms, and the results lasted up to twelve months. But this type of therapy is still in the testing phase and not extensively available yet.
What Can I do Now to Find Tinnitus Relief?
Regrettably, it will probably be quite a while before novel therapies like this are broadly available. So perhaps you’re wondering what you can do now to help manage your tinnitus.
Luckily, there are some newer tinnitus therapy devices on the market today. And one of the best new ways to manage tinnitus is something you’ve likely already heard of: your hearing aid.
It works like this:
External sounds are enhanced by hearing aids. One reason why tinnitus is more noticeable as you lose your hearing is that the ringing is the only thing that stays loud while everything else becomes quieter. The volume of the outside world is raised by hearing aids. That doesn’t lower the volume of your tinnitus, but it might make the ringing less obvious.
Your hearing aid can mask the sound. If your hearing loss is relatively minor, then a masking device might be the best way to deal with your symptoms. A hearing aid has a comparable appearance to a masking device. And some hearing aids can be enhanced with masking technology. Your tinnitus symptoms can be obscured by sounds produced by this kind of technology. Whatever sound will best mask the ringing in your ears will be used, it may be a specific tone or even white noise.
Needless to say, this is just a starting point. We can show you devices that work best with tinnitus. Contact us.