Music Production School

Scientists hope that they have made a major breakthrough in curing the hearing condition of tinnitus.

Researchers at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit say that they have isolated the part of the brain which is affected by tinnitus. Dr Michael Seidman said that, now they have found the damaged area, they hope to focus a cure on it. Up until now it has always been thought the condition was caused by the ear.

Tinnitus is a condition where sounds are heard in one or both ears when there is no external source. While doctors had thought tinnitus was generated by ear problems, they now believe it is generated in the brain. The team at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit used a special scanner to map the locations in the brain. They hope it will allow more targeted therapies to be developed.

The scan is called magnetoencephalography (MEG) and it measures the very small magnetic fields generated by intracellular electrical currents in the neuron cells in the brain.The team at the Henry Ford Hospital have already tried using chips which generate electrical noise directly in the brain in two patients to try to interfere with the tinnitus signals.

They are presenting their findings to the annual meeting of the American Academy of Otolaryngology.

Hopefully they do find a cure but in the meantime, if you do regularly listen to loud music, I suggest you invest in a proper pair of earplugs. They range from £5 for cheap foam ones – £200 + for custom fitted filtered ones. Whilst really cheap ones will muffle the sound, a decent pair will attenuate it ie. reduce the volume while keeping the overall quality of the mix.