3 ms·

"Multiple studies have shown that constant earplug wearing, day and night, over just one week is enough to result in new-onset tinnitus" just an anecdote, but

"Multiple studies have shown that constant earplug wearing, day and night, over just one week is enough to result in new-onset tinnitus" just an anecdote, but a few years ago i was wearing earplugs (regular non-noise cancelling) for really long hours every day and i had to stop because it was making my tinnitus really bad. ive been using over ear headphones for a while now and they don't seem to set off my tinnitus in the same way

steve1977 3y ago
Same here. I wonder if it’s something with the audio they emit or more related to the physical stimulation of the ear (by having something plugged into it). Mine were AirPods Pro, incidentally there’s quite a lot of reports of this phenomenon with them (which might be coincidence of course considering their popularity).
- 8fingerlouie 3y ago
  > I wonder if it’s something with the audio they emit or more related to the physical stimulation of the ear I doubt it's the audio they emit, as they don't really emit any audio (when only cancelling noise). The "trick" with ANC is that it cancels out the sound wave that would otherwise be noise. One of the theories around tinnitus is that some of the auditory nerves become "overexcited", causing them to fire more frequently, which essentially leads to your brain "amplifying" the sound, and the tinnitus is a byproduct of this amplification. Much like speakers will "hiss" if you turn on the amplifier without any music playing. The underlying reason for the amplification happening in the first place is usually mild hearing loss. That also somewhat explains why (my) tinnitus is usually worse in quiet surroundings (again back to the amplifier analogy). in any case, that's how my MD described it to me. I have mild tinnitus, probably caused by years of riding a motorbike without earplugs in.
  - darkclouds 3y ago
    Suggestions exist that the tiny hairs inside our ears are used for sensing the sound, low cysteine levels in normal hair is associated with brittle hair[1] Zinc also binds to cysteine to make structures in the body, like zinc fingers, and binds with histidine for myleoid cells like mast cells and remylination of the nervous system. so are low zinc, cysteine and histidine levels a factor for tinnitus? [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1176799/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1176799/

steve1977 3y ago

Same here. I wonder if it’s something with the audio they emit or more related to the physical stimulation of the ear (by having something plugged into it). Mine were AirPods Pro, incidentally there’s quite a lot of reports of this phenomenon with them (which might be coincidence of course considering their popularity).

8fingerlouie 3y ago
> I wonder if it’s something with the audio they emit or more related to the physical stimulation of the ear I doubt it's the audio they emit, as they don't really emit any audio (when only cancelling noise). The "trick" with ANC is that it cancels out the sound wave that would otherwise be noise. One of the theories around tinnitus is that some of the auditory nerves become "overexcited", causing them to fire more frequently, which essentially leads to your brain "amplifying" the sound, and the tinnitus is a byproduct of this amplification. Much like speakers will "hiss" if you turn on the amplifier without any music playing. The underlying reason for the amplification happening in the first place is usually mild hearing loss. That also somewhat explains why (my) tinnitus is usually worse in quiet surroundings (again back to the amplifier analogy). in any case, that's how my MD described it to me. I have mild tinnitus, probably caused by years of riding a motorbike without earplugs in.
- darkclouds 3y ago
  Suggestions exist that the tiny hairs inside our ears are used for sensing the sound, low cysteine levels in normal hair is associated with brittle hair[1] Zinc also binds to cysteine to make structures in the body, like zinc fingers, and binds with histidine for myleoid cells like mast cells and remylination of the nervous system. so are low zinc, cysteine and histidine levels a factor for tinnitus? [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1176799/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1176799/