Distraught at the persistent ringing in his ears and his inability to alleviate it, a 50-year-old man has visited his health care provider

Question

After diagnostic testing, no objective cause (like impacted cerumen or vascular abnormality) was found. Given these testing results, which of the following teaching points by the care provider is most appropriate?
A)
"This is most often the result of a psychological disturbance, and therapy is often useful in relieving tinnitus."
B)
"There are many drugs such as blood pressure pills, relaxants, heart medications, and antihistamines that can cause tinnitus."
C)
"A specialist can listen with a sensitive microphone to determine whether you are actually hearing these sounds."
D)
"There are some treatments like tinnitus retraining therapy, which includes the extended use of low-noise generators, which has shown good success."

Answer 1

Ans:
D

Feedback:

Current treatment modalities for tinnitus address the symptoms of the problem rather than curing the underlying etiology. While therapy can be of some use, it is inaccurate to characterize tinnitus as a psychological disturbance. Medications, including antihistamines, anticonvulsant drugs, calcium channel blockers, benzodiazepines, and antidepressants, have been used for tinnitus alleviation; they are not implicated as a cause. While listening to differentiate between objective and subjective tinnitus is possible, the absence of objective sounds does not mean that tinnitus does not exist, rather that it is subjective. The use of tinnitus retraining therapy, which includes directive counseling and extended use of low-noise generators to facilitate auditory adaptation to the tinnitus, has met with considerable success.