Posted: July 25, 2011
Tinnitus retraining is one of the most common methods of acquiring tinnitus relief. It is a form of clinical treatment that involves training the mindset of the sufferer to divert his/her attention away from the intrusive sounds of tinnitus. This is based mainly on the basis that almost all human body actions are habits made from perception. Tinnitus retraining follows the basic concept of eliminating the adverse perceptions about the tinnitus condition in the sufferer’s mind by helping him/her become aware of what’s causing his/her condition. Through the treatment’s counseling sessions, the sufferer will be taught of different methods to lessen his/her focus on his or her present condition.
Tinnitus retraining has three main objectives. One is to diminish the patient’s worry and fear of something that is non-existent. Second is to make him/her understand that recovery is possible. Third is to teach him/her different ways to acquire hearing loss treatment in case tinnitus leads to loss of hearing.
The tinnitus retraining therapist achieves the above-mentioned objectives by asking the patient to undergo sound and counseling therapy which aims to divert his/her attention to other external sounds instead of focusing on the tinnitus sounds such as hissing, buzzing, or ringing sounds in the ears. Proponents of this tinnitus treatment method based this concept on the ability of the brain to learn, relearn, and ignore whatever the mind perceived as irrelevant.
Here’s the outline of the tinnitus retraining:
1. The First Session
The first TRT session is used to check the facts about the tinnitus sufferer in order to determine the problem that led to the tinnitus condition. The first session is also used by the doctor to determine how bad the hearing problem is. The doctor also checks the patient’s tolerance to the sounds produced by tinnitus. The doctor also checks the medical history of the patient to determine if the condition is caused by medical or health conditions, including Mernier’s disease, anemia or hypertension, or any other problem such as the presence of foreign object in the ear canals of the person suffering from this condition. This is also the time when the doctor evaluates the appropriateness of tinnitus retraining as tinnitus treatment.
2. Fitting of the Tinnitus Masker
During this session, the patient will choose his or her preferred type of device that will be used to produce his white noise, one of the most important parts of the TRT method. Patients usually have two choices for tinnitus masker. The first is a hearing aid or an earphone-like device and the second is the desktop device. Moreover, the patient will also be asked to choose his or her preferred white noise as this is mainly dependent on the preference of the patient.
3. Post Treatment Analysis of TRT
The TRT post treatment analysis is the session when the doctor evaluates how this method has helped the patient divert his or her attention from the intrusive sounds produced by the condition to other external sounds with or without the help of a tinnitus masker. One of the main objectives of the tinnitus retraining is to eliminate the stress the patient feels. This is due to the fact that stress is one of the major contributing factors of tinnitus. In this session, the doctor determines any negativity in the tinnitus condition so that it can be replaced with other methods of treatment for this condition.
