Differences Among Patients That Make Their Tinnitus Worse or Better.

Purpose: Our objective was to identify activities that influence tinnitus and to determine if conditional probabilities exist among such variables.

Method: Two hundred fifty-eight patients were asked the following two questions: "When you have your tinnitus, which of the following makes it worse?" and "Which of the following reduces your tinnitus?"

Results: Things that made tinnitus better included noise (31%) and relaxation (15%). Things that made tinnitus worse included being in a quiet place (48%), stress (36%), being in a noisy place (32%), and lack of sleep (27%). Almost 6% of patients suggested coffee/tea and 4% said certain foods made their tinnitus worse. Conditional probabilities indicated that for those whose tinnitus is not worse in quiet, it is usually not reduced by noise. For those whose tinnitus is not worse in noise, it is usually not reduced in quiet.

Conclusion: There are dramatic differences among patients. Such differences need to be considered in planning treatments.