Tinnitus is a persistent ringing, buzzing, or whirring sound in your ears; it can be loud or soft, pulsing or steady. It is usually caused by a fault in the auditory system; it is a symptom, not a disease in itself.

There is currently no approved or effective medicine or surgery to treat tinnitus; doctors prescribe behavioural therapies that simply ‘habituate’ people to the condition.

A pilot study underway at the Bionics Institute may finally offer hope of establishing a baseline for tracking the complex changes that tinnitus triggers in our brains using a brain imaging technique called functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS).  Read more about our research here.

Would you like to help us get closer to understanding Tinnitus?

Donate today!