Tinnitus

Clinical and Research Perspectives summarizes contemporary findings from basic and clinical research regarding tinnitus mechanisms, effects, and interventions. The text features a collection of international authors, active researchers, and clinicians who provide an expansive scope of material that ensures relevance for patients and professionals. Reviews and reports of contemporary research findings underscore the text s value for classroom use in audiology and otolaryngology programs. Patients and students of audiology will benefit from the text s coverage of tinnitus mechanisms, emerging practice considerations, and expectations for outcomes--for example, recent successes of cognitive behavioral therapy, neuromodulation, and hearing aid use. These and other topics, such as the effects of noise and drugs on tinnitus, are reported in a way that enhances clinicians ability to weave such strategies into their own work. The influence of tinnitus on all aspects of life is explored, from art to medicine and communication to isolation, thereby providing clinicians and patients a deeper understanding of and greater facility managing a tinnitus experience. Finally, this text includes case studies that provide a practical view of tinnitus effects and management approaches. The editors hope that the consideration of mechanisms, interventions, and outcomes resonates with patients, clinicians, and students of audiology.

Chapters such as Tinnitus in Literature, Film, and Music make clear the ubiquity of the tinnitus experience and reinforce for patients that while tinnitus may be isolating, it is a shared experience. Other chapters, such as Musical Hallucination, and Acoustic Shock, address problems experienced by patients who experience not only tinnitus, but unusual auditory system behaviors that may be confused with tinnitus, or that can exacerbate a patient s emotional response to tinnitus. Chapters covering conditions that complicate tinnitus management provide clinical findings that support intervention strategies. Subtypes of tinnitus that require medical attention are reviewed in order to clarify sources of the sounds, as well as the appropriate referrals that should follow the identification of such sensations.