Tinnitus: Ringing in the Brain | Josef Rauschecker | TEDxCharlottesville 

As someone who deals with tinnitus, I'm very happy to learn, that there's something going on bout the T. I thought it was marginalized and no one gave a dang. Suddenly this guys happens on TEDx Talks. Thank you so much. I hope they will find the cure.

My only wish is to hear silence... 😥

My tinnitus went away when I had brain treatment due to a rear-end auto collision. Markus Ernst is from Germany with an office in Colorado Springs. He knows how to treat brain injuries. I was privileged to experience Gyrostim Therapy and have excellent results from this modern scientific treatment.

I'd let live spiders hang from my ears if that would fix the problem.

In meditation I've found that I can calm down that noise just like calming any agitated thoughts by using the breath which absorbs the agitated thoughts and noise like catching a cricket ball where you go in the direction of the ball to absorb it's momentum and energy then you slowly release it's energy bit by bit which desolves it's energy bit by bit, or it's like capturing it's energy in a bubble of air or breath then you're able to control that bubble by deflatting it until the energy dissapates, when people have obsessive thoughts they always try to control their thoughts with other thoughts but it gets worse because you can't control your thoughts but you can control the breath and its the breath which will control and calm down your thoughts, and once your breath is calm you'll feel calm and at peace, and the agitation of tinnitus is just another agitation so when you don't react to it it starts to calm down as well.

I’ve had it for 10 years since getting a bad case of Lyme Disease. It’s awful always having this “noise” in my head. I’m dealing with it best I can at this point. I also have hypercussis also from Lyme. I hear background noises and far away sounds (like a bionic ear👂) sometimes better than when someone in close proximity speaks to me. I also get startled a lot when someone comes up behind me, even in a store, because usually I don’t hear them approaching and suddenly they are in my space or passing by.

I have had Tinnitus for 3 plus years ago. It resulted from likely a cold coupled with four young girls sitting behind me, screaming at a high frequency during a Adam Levin concert. Been searching every since.

I was born deaf in one ear and only 65% in the other. As I got older I lost my hearing down to 7% . The noise was getting loud. Then I got the cochlear implant and was told that the noise would go away. No that didn't happen. It got worse. I drown it out at times with music. But now I reconise it as frequencies. It will shift and change with my body. I am starting to use it to my advantage. It helps me to understand what my spirit is doing. I believe highly spiritual people will have over active noise. We think it's noise because we don't understand it. Just a thought

"La ayuda va en camino" que Dios lo permita algún día.

My biggest complaint with Ted Talks is that the slides are not all shown. The speaker is directing us to see something in the slides, yet we cannot. Please record the slides, we don't need 18 minute videos of the speaker referring to something we cannot see.

I can’t even imagine if they could silence my ringing.

I have been suffering from tinnitus for 5 years after I was attacked by a student and kicked in the face. It goes up and down but it is always there. Often it wakes me up at night. I have been put on medication that had bad side effects such as sun burn when barely outside with dizziness and was originally a medication for depression that caused depression. The 2nd prescription which causes dizziness going into a 2nd day.

I have tinnitus but mine sounds like crickets. I grew up near a swamp and fell asleep to this noise. It is so comforting and I just pretend I’m a child again, safe and secure. God Bless All!

Help is on the way.

I have read through the comments and want to thank everyone. I really noticed how badly I have it after I bought Bose noise-cancelling headphones! Staring at the blue light of a computer definitely makes it worse and I have heard of "orange" glasses you can wear but, I am sure there is an app for it (or there is by now!) I have been working on lowering all the inflammation I am riddled with diet as some have mentioned. I am going to the Julian Cowan Hill videos now since so many of you folks found them helpful. Thanks again for such hopeful comments, Cheers, from Toronto ☮

I have some hope for relief from this nightmare after listening to this doctor, but will it come soon enough for me and others my age? I am 63...and 64 in six months.

I am not researcher on this essue, but when my blood pressure going high then normal with stress, anxiety level the noise coming back to me.

For ALL you people suffering from this, yes myself also. My studies in sound reproduction taught me this; find the exact frequency you're 'hearing'. Buy yourself a program on the internet, that allows an accurate sweep from 20-20,000 khz. It's HIGHLY unlikely you can reach the upper or perhaps lower, but nevertheless don'tcha worry. You'll require decent sound reproduction, so don't use junk supermarket earphones. Mid-upper echelon of audio technica/ koss,/ etymotic etc will suit. Planar, or electrostatic even better for higher frequencies. If you have a decent soundcard, fair enough, feed it to a half decent amplifier, then to head ( ear ) phones. Then relax, and I MEAN relax! Have silence all around, and slowly, VERY slowly sweep up through the auditory frequency spectrum. When you either limit, or cannot hear any sound- that's what you need to record. Myself, ( one ear), it starts at 3850 yet finished at 5160 khz. The other ear is different. Amplitude, can be adjusted normally. No more than is needed mind. When you have everything correct, your tinitus will stop or, be severely limited. Chuck it on a half decent MP3 player, pref at 320kbps. Then, just relax and listen. Equal sound frequencies, cancel each other out. No guarantee I offer, but it worked for me. ........take your time.........

I've been dealing with tinnitus for almost a year and half. It appeared suddenly, after a nap, I was dealing with a lot of stress at that time. Most times I don't pay attention to the sound, and in good days I can just ignore it when I go to sleep. But sometimes, out of nothing, the sound gets louder. I try to calm myself, and then it gets better. Mine is likely due to a jaw problem, and stress, but the doctors didn't point to one specific cause. But I remember when I visited the doctor specialist and he said that I had to undergo a hearing exam... How scary that was. He couldn't rule out the probability that I was MAYBE losing my hearing. It was a terrible experience.

I've had tinnitus for several years, but never realised it is linked to emotions. Now we know it's a brain problem, rather than a hearing problem, could meditation or other mind-over-matter practices be used to help? I always just thought it was my ears

If it helps I’m 21 and have developed it in my left ear due to an infection which caused me stress and I have genetic hearing loss so combining that all together I have it now, I notice mine flares up when stressed and anxious when at home it’s so low in volume I hardly notice it. I’m so glad I’m not alone In this

I have to stick my fingers in my ears to work out whether its a fire alarm going off or just the noises playing in my head!!

2 days after I received my covid booster shot I was awakened by what sounded like someone ringing a loud bell in my left ear. I had never had any problems with tinnitus prior to that. It has since morphed into a vacuum cleaner sound in both ears, sometimes loud and sometimes barely there. Hoping it goes away at some point.

I tried to stop it but I failed. Last night I was going in circles around and around and around …. It’s driving me crazy and I can’t take it anymore. I can’t reach it and it’s scary because I’m not in control. My anxiety is high and I’m getting depressed. I'm in a dark place, maybe this is the end!!!

videeje 7 let staré a lék nikde, je opravdu nutné s tímto žít, v dnešní době, utlumující léky na depresi nechci je někdo kdo pomůže? Moderátor

Tinnitus is like that hideous creature in the first "Alien" movie - no matter what the crew tried, they could not get that creature out of the spaceship.

There is a connection between the ringing and oxygen I think. His is intermittent depending on his stress level. Stress changes oxygen levels in the body. Buteyko breathing and meditation brings mine down almost to nothing. Hair cell damage might be an exception, but a lot of tissue or cell loss has to do with oxygen. What else reduces oxygen? Insulin issues. Overweight.

Great talk! Very informative and insightful!

I developed it after I had my C3/4 vertebrae fused at age 48. It’s bad in my left ear, noticeable in the right ear.

I seem to be one of the 'rare cases' then, with having tinnitus but no hearing loss. I had my hearing tested after the tinnitus started, and it was at the level of a 20-year old...

Higher quality hearing aids "trained" my brain to be tinnitus free. My tinnitus sounds exactly like the sandblasting nozzle that I worked with for 30 years of my construction career

I wish he would do something on Hyperacusis. So much confusion out there.

Yep, tinnitus, what a joyous cacophony of tones Three different constant tones of different pitch, apparently both ears The only cure I am aware of for me is my own demise I haven't taken the cure yet (obviously) It is however a consideration but a terrible option for the future that may result in no hearing at all... forever Does this RING a bell? What to do, what to do, what to do

Since college I had tinnitus, ringing was so intense that I was falling into depression, I asked universe to help me overcome this and it guided me to Shirlest, after few weeks of using it ringing was slowly disappearing, now I live a life like I should, thanks to Shirlest

I'm 71 and I have had tinnitus since 1974. it has grown worse over the years. In my case, it's a very high pitch in both ears. It is very loud. My ears have become very sensitive to abrupt sounds, but I don't let it get me down. I ignore it the best I can, but that is requiring a lot of determination these days. It sometimes gets to me and I languish for a while wishing the ringing would stop, trying to imagine what silence is like. The funny thing is that I have played harmonica since I was ten and still love to play. I still have good pitch, too. I usually avoid watching videos on tinnitus because they end up offering fake cures that require a subscription, etc. This is the first time I see something that makes sense (I am a retired DC). I hope they succeed in finding a treatment plan soon.

1:56 lower your sound if you are a tinnitus or hyperacusis sufferer. This loud tone can be really hard to handle. Upvote please to help others.

I've had tinnitus for over 40 years. It's always there (high frequency), but you get used to it. You have to, or you go mad.

as horrible as it is to live with this it’s comforting to know that im not alone in this it gives some sort of hope

Who have tinnitus here? Lets pray for them.I have it now just now sept 21 2019 im sad :(

At night the silence is so loud.

These medical researchers are the actual heroes in our society , not the sports stars or the musical stars or the television stars or the movie stars .

Tinnitus correlates with stress and depression?!... with the limbic system?! Even as a nursing student at the time this video was posted, tinnitus has always been explained to me as "idiopathic." This means the cause and physiological processes are unknown. Thank you for this information and the opportunity to understand my tinnitus. I wish the best to my fellow tinnitus sufferers!

To hear silence again would be beyond description.

It's the first sound that I hear when I wake up and it's the last sound I hear when I drift off to sleep... and it follows me around all day. I can hear people just fine when they face me when they're talking, but if they're some distance away, speaking more quietly or not facing me I can always hear that they are talking, but it often makes it difficult to clearly hear their words. And, when I'm in a more noisy environment, like a restaurant, it just seems to get louder and complicate conversations. It's really hard to explain this to the people who are closest to me because they think I'm losing my hearing and keep pushing me to get hearing aids, but they don't understand it's not that I can't hear, it's that I constantly hear something I don't want to hear that makes it harder to hear the things I really want to hear. This is the first time I've had the opportunity to share comments with people who understand what I've been experiencing for more than forty years. Thanks for "listening."

I'm 33 and have it so bad I made plans to end my life but fortunately my family intervened. It's still a daily struggle and I hope we make medical advances some day. I wouldn't wish this condition on my worst enemy.

May I hear silence again one day

I clearly remember a sinking feeling when the realization that my life with tinnitus was the new normal hit me. The emotional stages of grief that followed shook me at my roots. I largely can ignore it during the day now and feel stronger from the experience but like almost everyone, the quite nights that used to be so glorious have now become a cacophony that takes away what was once a precious time. Please keep up the good work!

i have it since i was very young, it drove me mad at first, there were times that i really thought about killing myself, it was horrible but i have learn to live with it i had no other choice, but I'm still have some hope for a cure

I have tinnitus. I say that "it's my auditory contact with The Universe." Sort of an Ommm....... :)

@1:59 I would appreciate a freaking warning before they blast a high pitched tone at twice the volume of the speaker. Jesus Christ.

I’ve have this for years. It’s a hissing sound that never goes away. The phrase “silence is golden” is so under rated. This is an update after a year that I wrote this and I don’t know if this will help anyone else but I had an iron infusion due to being anemic and while I was undergoing this my tinnitus disappeared and it has not come back. I don’t know if it’s an iron deficiency but it’s gone.

I cried while watching... I have noise-induced tinnitus (loud music) and it's bad. This gives me hope. I'm 21. The thought of not having to live the majority of my life with the ringing and hissing and headaches-- Man, that would be really swell. I want to have some silence again. Hopeful for a cure in my lifetime.

I was 9 months pregnant when I woke up on my 30th birthday with tinnitus and Bell's Palsy. My doctor said that he'd never seen anyone with that disorder that late in pregnancy. I wasn't permitted to take time off without pay from my 2nd grade teaching position, so I had to teach 30 seven-year-olds after having sleep interruptions to get up and feed my newborn. The students were so loud during the day that the sounds were camouflaged, but I never experienced quiet over the two years I dealt with it. I heard whistling, someone blowing in my ear, geese honking, and other sounds and it was driving me mad, but when I was pregnant with my second baby and caught a bad head cold, the sounds slowly went away as I recovered from the virus. I am now 73 and it never came back. I have so much empathy for those who are suffering with it because I completely understand how life-changing it is. The only thing that kept me from considering suicide was my little baby. I truly wish they would find something that could help (other than listening to the static between radio stations--what I was told to listen to so I could fall asleep).

As a science student who somewhat suffers from this, I'm inclined to study neurology to understand Tinnitus, in the hopes of one day countering it. This is quite the motivating presentation~

Haven't heard silence in 40 years. Maybe in my last moments the brain starts shutting down and I get a silent moment or even a day. Just silence, a simple thing most people enjoy and have no idea how valuable the experience is.

I know you might've heard this before.......but tinnitus sufferers hang in there, be strong, WE GOT THIS!

In Jesus name i command Tinitus to leave the individual who is reading this !

I'm going to find an end to this and i'm going to show the world

I never hear my chronic tinnitus in my dreams.

Last month I have a tinnitus, which makes me worried about my future and self, this ringing brought me anxiety. Later then I ask God to help me out, I read Bible and the driven life purpose book that helped me a lot to connect with God finding my true purpose. After days and weeks that has passed I learned to don't be bothered by this ringings and live my life according to God's purpose....And yesterday a miracle happened, God granted my prayers He allowed my tinnitus to heal, like I can't explain how it happened, like just suddenly! And for that I am very thankful to God, not just for healing my tinnitus but also for transforming me into a new person. God is so good, He just need to see our faith, He works in disguise, things are not always impromptu, God needs our patience.

20 years having tinnitus and I have noticed it gets louder when under major stress

When I was 22, went instantly deaf in right ear, ringing started immediately along with vertigo...that went away but tinnitus continues, I am 80 now!!

I've suffered from tinnitus for over 20 yrs. It's a nightmare that I wouldn't wish on anyone.

I used to have it after some time of sleep deprivation. Or stress. Eventually it stopped and I hope it doesn't come back.

I'm fifteen, and I've had tinnitus for as long as I can remember. Sometimes, it gets really bad. I have the first type of tinnitus/ the first sound, the ringing. But instead of a low drowning whine, it's a more highpitched one, and very earsplitting. Here's hoping for a cure!

I have only just discovered this video. His words, "help is on the way, we're not there yet, but help is on the way" brought tears and I broke down and cried that someone cares about root cause ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

GOD HEAL US !!! I'M SO TIRED OF IT ... SUFFERING ALL MOST 13YRS.

I’ve lived with tinnitus for 27 years. After a severe ear infection when I was 19 the ringing started and never stopped since. I have been able to “tune” it out after a while. Sometimes weeks pass before I’m consciously aware of it. I hope you all have found ways to cope with tinnitus.

Got it when I was 18, Most depressing time of my life learning to accept the reality of living with such a condition. At 30 years old it's still there but I consider myself healed from it, If I MAKE my self aware of it I will hear it, But if I ignore it by just living my life, it's non existent. Honestly if it went away, I probably wouldn't even notice until I decided to "check" on it in a quiet room.

Thank you for this. Sadly the most amazing thing about this is it wasn't someone trying to sell snake oil. I'm really happy to see some of the underlying mechanics of this and it also hints at the underlying connection to Hyperacusis.

I've had it for 30 years :) For anyone with it, I recommend don't fight it. Just accept it and your life goes on, it's not so bad really when you think of all the other possibilities that can go wrong with health. I hardly think about it now.

I've had tinnitus for over 50 years, a constant high pitched sound! I hope that a cure can be found within my lifetime. Thanks Prof. Rauschecker for your work.

Very interesting to read other people's experience. I suffer from a high-pitched tinnitus 24 hours a day. I have learned to live with it. When I am seeking quiet time is when I notice it the most. It has impacted my life in that; I have to look directly at the person speaking and do some lip-reading if there are background sounds. If a person is speaking to me quietly and not enunciating their words; it just sounds like a mumble. I have found that in group settings, I tend to not engage in the conversation much anymore. I am now the quiet listener because I miss a lot of what is going on in the group conversation. Sad because I enjoy conversing with others so much.

I have had this for years.. feel like l am losing my mind....Hard to sleep' l lost my mother Sept 22 2020 and it has been non stop for 7 months. l PRAY for all who has this.

"What you focus on grows" I have this experience. It gets more intense when I WANT it to go away. I learned to identify it for what it actually is... Sound. When I notice the sound I now just repeat the sound, sound, sound. For me it appears that my mind gets bored and then shifts focus onto something else. Tinnitus is probably still there, but my mind is no longer "stuck" on it wanting to run away.

Guys leave the speach and read comments, these are more motivating

When I first noticed my tinnitus, in 2010, I felt panic/claustrophobia/anxiety and also grief for the silence I will most likely never know again. But now, although the tinnitus is still here, in both ears, ALL the time (the steady high-pitched tone) I pay no attention to it and I mostly forget it's there. It definitely gets louder when I'm stressed.

I suffered with this for years. The past year I started to take my health back. Getting right nutrients. Magnesium, d3k2, iodine, did some fasting, keto diet, eliminated sugar and processed carbs, I also used tea tree oil around and behind the ear. Had issues with ears for years. Unwanted pathogens can hide out in the ears . I don't know if it was one particular thing or a combination but I have been free from this for months now. I hope you all can find a healing path.

Wow! Had Tinnitus for over 45 years and depression for 20 years, and it is the first time I hear there is a relationship between these two diseases...

My tinnitus was caused by a loud explosion. There was also some hearing loss. It was still there after 8 years (and still VERY annoying). I was told by a top neurologist it would never go away (having had it that long). But during that time I had made significant changes to my diet and lifestyle habits, and after ten years it was gone. I was tested to verify that it was actually gone (and not just my imagination). It was, and my hearing loss had improved. So when tinnitus is caused by acoustic trauma to the ear, the body can heal it, it just needs the resources (and it must first finish dealing with more serious issues that you may not even be aware of, then it can turn its attention to something like tinnitus). So, yes, for some types of tinnitus, there is a cure.

He lost me at, “There is no cure.”. Damn this ringing!

It came out of the blu....for few weeks just a mild hissing and then it exploded....it was so bad that I considered suicide....visited every dr, clinic, changed diet.....nights were horrendous....it was so loud that I couldn’t believe that a person next to me couldn’t hear it. Had to stop working, went into a deep depression, lost friends....really lost my life for awhile. Still have it, it’s livable, I guess with time one adjusts. But what I wouldn’t give for silence. Good luck,everyone.

Thanks for this! As a follow-up to this TED Talk, we had the pleasure of speaking with Josef Rauschecker on the Tinnitus Talk Podcast. He's such a great guy, and sincerely cares about his line of work, finding solutions for tinnitus. Not to mention that he has tinnitus himself. We wish Josef the best of luck :-)

I still believe I can cure myself from this tinnitus I need to listen to my body more

I have tinnitus for a year now, I pray I don't have to deal with this forever.

I've had it my entire life after a reaction to antibiotics took most of my hearing in my right ear. It's terrible, but alot of the time you can trick yourself into not noticing it. Play some games, read, and having light music in the background always helps. The more you hone in on it, the worse it gets. I sympathize with everyone who's gotten it and knew what it was like without it, but if your mind is distracted it really helps. All the best to you all

If you are watching this video and reading the comments, it means you already have the idea of what tinnitus is and you have also probably Googled it, and somewhere on your way you have reached here. I'd also assume that you are already suffering from it right now and maybe found out that it isn't normal and you think you should go see a doctor. Now after watching this talk you might think that there's is no cure, and there's no hope for now? That even after a long time, if your tinnitus hasn't gone away, maybe you just have to live with it? Hearing loss? I'd like you to stop your thoughts right there before it spirals down the path of feeling helpless and numb and anxious, to say the least. Yes, the risks are a possibility, permanent damages may be devastating mentally more so than just physically. You might have already glanced at some comments about people's own personal experiences of depression and and other darkest thoughts due to tinnitus. I'd like to gently remind you the one golden rule of internet- "DO NOT LOOK UP SYMPTOMS AND DISEASES ON GOOGLE (also anywhere else on internet)" One thing you should keep in mind from this talk, the key takeaway, if nothing else, should be the simple statistic that tinnitus is a common problem, and among those who HAVE it, just a small % actually has serious problems. 1:30 Please take a moment to breathe first and assess your own perspective and your own problems. YOUR very own kind of tinnitus, maybe, is causing the problems YOU are actually having now. I'd also like to remind that there may exist no CURE (at the time of this video) but there are TREATMENTS, which will vary depending on your own particular case. 1:45 Based on those facts only, keep in mind that it's not too late, it's never too late (I'm assuming). Do this first: 1. Remove all the LOUD & LONG-TERM (or continuous) noise sources from your life, as soon as you can manage 2. If you can not do that, consider wearing protection. You do wear sunglasses to protect your eyes right? Treat your hearing the same please 3. Even if you manage to do this above, don't waste time, fix an appointment to your "nearest ENT specialist". Just search that phrase in quotes in your maps application and call them whenever you get the chance. Tell them you think you might have tinnitus, describe your noise type (frequency, pitch, is it like hissing or ringing? Is it continuous? Do mention the reason you think you might have your tinnitus) Ask your ENT specialist if you'll be needing an appointment, an then carry on the conversation accordingly. Lastly, remember another golden rule of internet- don't take any Internet stranger's words without thinking about it. Including me. Consult only your ENT doctor firsthand, get clear directions on what to do next. Do not discuss with friends or family if they have a tendency to worry about you and get more anxiety. Anxiety is infectious. Talk with a professional, assure what to do next very clearly, ensure the treatment and preventions, then discuss with others. I'm saying all this from my own personal (that is, anecdotal) experience

I have learned to love my tinnitus, it sounds like the insect life singing during a summer night. Very easy to fall asleep with this. It's been a real blessing during long and boring meetings.

My tinnitus didn't become an issue until some time ago. Usually when there's another sound, I no longer hear the ringing. However, now it has become louder and it will not stop no matter what noises are around me. After a long time of "silence" (or a time without other outside noises), it actually began to hurt.

I am 27 with tinitus and it makes me depressed knowing I have to put up with this for the rest of my life :(

i have had this most of my life, i am so used to the ring it doesnt bother me at all, my blood pressure effects the level of loudness, so sometimes i know when my pressure changes, so it has a use :P

have had it for 70 yrs u learn to live with it

Hi I'm rich 29 and I've had it for years now!this video gave me in the hope that one day we all can put this behind us and move on we can live with it just don't give up anybody you're not alone just remember that

Hard to explain, but there is a brief moment ,when I first wake up , before my brain is totally awake, there is no ringing in my ears.

I have noise-induced tinnitus from a concert and this gives me so much hope.

I had tinnitus. Had my hearing tested and it was PERFECT. I had been under a tremendous amount of stress. After some time - removing myself from the stress-the tinnitus STOPPED.

I should change my name to Cicadas 24/Seven

Scientists only know and trouble but they don't know the solutions 🤣🤣😁

Thanks for giving hope... I’m so depressed because of tinittus

I tried calling the tinnitus hotline. It just keeps ringing.