We have developed a novel tinnitus treatment approach (
"tailor-made notched music training"). An evaluation study demonstrated the effectiveness of this approach for tinnitus patients exhibiting a specific tinnitus profile.The study participants were patients:
- with chronic tinnitus (> 12 months)
- with tonal tinnitus (i.e. tinnitus sounded peep- or whistle-like)
- without severe hearing loss (< 35 dB)
- of rather young age (approximately 40 years on average).
The novel treatment approach is a
music training that aims at the
reduction of tinnitus loudness and annoyance. The patients could select the treatment music by themselves ("favourite music"). Moreover, the music was modified for each patient individually - so each patient literally listened to
"tailor-made" music. The modification of the music altered the frequency spectrum. The daily listening to the customized music
(1 to 2 hours) over the course of 12 months supposedly triggered neurophysiological processes, which reduced the tinnitus loudness.You can purchase reprints of our article regarding this study via the website of the journal
"Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS)". Alternatively, a PDF of the article can be downloaded
here.At present, it remains unresolved whether the music training would be effective in
patients with different tinnitus profiles (e.g. older patients, patients with hearing loss, patients with very high tinnitus frequencies, or patients with noisiform tinnitus).The tailor-made notched music training is not a cure - the tinnitus of the study participants became less loud, but it did not disappear completely.In
follow-up studies, the tailor-made notched music training approach is going to be further developed and evaluated. Currently, we are are running
studies by means of which we intend to improve the efficacy of the music training.The Institute for Biomagnetism & Biosignalanalysis is a research department. It is our aim to further develop and carefully evaluate the notched-music training approach, necessarily based on a limited number of participants.
To date, the treatment approach is accessible only via study participation. We are not a medical departement, and therefore we are not allowed to offer treatment. However, we are trying to establish cooperations with ENT-departments in order to offer the treatment to many more patients through large-scale clinical trials.If you wish to stay informed regarding
running and planned studies (state: 29.08.2011) and further developments, please visit our website, which will be updated regularly.
