I aware I’ll generate a chorus of ‘Wimp!’, ‘Whiner!’, and ‘Poor baby!’ taunts for this post on tinnitus. But they’ll be from folks who’ve never laid awake wondering why somebody up the street is using their power mower at midnight…
That’s just one manifestation of the much-debated, much dreaded, incurable affliction known as tinnitus. Otherwise known as ‘ringing in your ears’.
We know why it happens…
We think. But after more than a hundred years, we still haven’t come up with a definitive way to treat it. Much less, prevent or cure it.
And that’s a shame. Because the annoying affliction can affect those who live or work with primary sufferers just as much as it does the sufferers themselves. And that may be costing us all millions of person-hours of otherwise productive time a year.
What it is…
I hasten to specify that tinnitus is not a psychiatric problem. Those who mistakenly believe it’s the same has ‘hearing voices’ do those of us who suffer from tinnitus a grave disservice. It can be mad-dening, but I’ve never heard of a single psychotic who blamed their serial murder spree on the condition.
The Mayo Clinic describes tinnitus as, “when you experience ringing or other noises in one or both of your ears. The noise […] isn’t caused by an external sound, and other people usually can’t hear it.
It can present as ‘phantom’ ringing, buzzing, roaring, clicking, hissing or humming. And it’s more com-mon than you might think. Mayo says tinnitus may afflict as many as 15 to 20 percent of us, and is ‘especially common in older adults’.
For some, tinnitus improves with treatment of the underlying cause or with other treatments that reduce or mask the noise, making tinnitus less noticeable. Known causes include age-related hearing loss, an ear injury or a problem with the circulatory system. It can also result from an ear infection or ear canal blockage, a head or neck injury, or a reaction to certain medications.
Common foods beneficial?
A new study suggests that consuming more fresh fruit, fibre, caffeine and dairy products may help reduce or (for some) eliminate tinnitus. The survey looked at data from 10 different previous studies on 15 foods and food groups as potential treatments for tinnitus. Only the aforementioned 4 showed positive associations.
The researchers speculate that known antioxidant and anti-inflammatory action of some of these foods may be responsible for their effectiveness as treatments. For others, the connection remains hazy.
My take
The new study is merely a survey of existing clinical and data-collection efforts that preserved the kind of data the researchers wanted to ‘mine’.
Setting aside natural curiosity about the causes of tinnitus, I have yo sat, I’ll be glad to try eating more foods from the 4 groups the survey suggests may help reduce the risk of tinnitus – if there’s any chance at all that will help reduce the frequency and severity my own ‘attacks’.
I’m going to try eating more foods from all 4 ‘recommended’ groups for a month or two, and then report back in this space…
~ Maggie J.