Starting with a thorough medical exam, the proper diagnosis and evaluation of tinnitus are both critical for successful tinnitus management.
The medical evaluation for Tinnitus
The evaluation will start with a thorough medical history, followed by a careful physical examination and diagnostic testing. These can provide important clues leading to the identification of the underlying cause of your tinnitus.
Tinnitus: Where does it arise?
Laboratory and imaging studies are sometimes required to obtain the correct diagnosis or to rule out potentially serious diseases underlying tinnitus. Prompt identification and management of causal and concurrent conditions in tinnitus may not only reduce their potentially detrimental consequences, but may also resolve or improve the tinnitus when the conditions are addressed.
Audiological evaluation is an inseparable and important part of tinnitus assessment. A hearing test is almost always needed to identify any condition that involves the auditory system. This should be the first step in an audiological evaluation of tinnitus, since about 90 percent of cases occur with hearing loss.
In addition to routine pure tone and speech audiometry, a range of audiological tests can help assess the health and function of your middle ear, inner ear, and auditory pathway. They may include tympanometry, otoacoustic emissions, electrocochleography, auditory brainstem responses, and vestibular evoked myogenic potentials.
References
- Liu H, Zhang J, Yang S, Wang X, Zhang W, Li J, Yang T. Efficacy of sound therapy interventions for tinnitus management: A protocol for systematic review and network meta-analysis. Medicine (Baltimore). 2021 Oct 15;100(41):e27509.
- Sereda M, Xia J, El Refaie A, Hall DA, Hoare DJ. Sound therapy (using amplification devices and/or sound generators) for tinnitus. Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2018 Dec 27;12(12):CD013094.