Tinnitus & Sound Sensitivity
What we see is small and cumulative. Sleeping through the night. Getting to four in the afternoon and realising you have not thought about it since breakfast. Not bracing when a room goes quiet. We cannot promise you any of it. It depends on your hearing, on what is driving the tinnitus, and on whether the plan actually gets followed.
We would rather show you honest patterns than invent testimonials. If you would like to read what real patients say about our care, please visit our reviews page.
At a glance
- Improvement is gradual and cumulative. Nobody in this clinic wakes up cured.
- Sleep normally moves first, and better sleep makes the daytime easier to carry.
- The most common good outcome is that the sound is still there and no longer runs your day.
- We do not publish testimonials. Unedited patient reviews are on our reviews page.
Relief arrives gradually, and you tend to notice it late
Habituation is not a moment. What comes up in follow-up appointments is that the sound registers less often and matters less when it does. Almost nobody notices this while it is happening. They notice it when we ask at a review visit and they work out that they stopped checking whether the tinnitus was still there.
Sleep usually moves first
Tinnitus is loudest in a quiet room, so bedtime is where most people struggle and where we usually see the first change. Sound enrichment at night is a small thing to set up and it earns its keep. When sleep improves, daytime tinnitus becomes easier to carry. It tends to happen in that order rather than the reverse.
When there is hearing loss too, hearing aids do a lot of the work
A great many of the tinnitus patients we see also have some hearing loss. Putting back the everyday sound their ears have stopped delivering reduces the contrast that makes the tinnitus stand out. We verify those fittings with real-ear measurement, because an under-amplified hearing aid will not do this. If your hearing is normal, hearing aids are not the answer for you and we will say so at the first visit.
The sound often stays. The reaction changes.
This is the outcome we see most, and the one people are least prepared for. The tinnitus is still there if you go looking for it. It has stopped being the first thing you notice in the morning and the thing you go to bed dreading. That is a real result, and it is the one people undersell to themselves, because they came in wanting silence.
Setbacks happen, and they are not failure
Stress, a bad night, a virus, a loud evening. Any of those can push tinnitus back up for a few days. We say this at the first appointment precisely so the first bad week does not end the plan. It is a fluctuation, not a relapse.
What to expect
What a tinnitus appointment actually involves
- We take the history first15 min
When it started, whether it is one ear or both, what it sounds like, what makes it worse, and what it is stopping you doing. Sleep and concentration matter here as much as the sound itself.
- A full diagnostic hearing evaluation30 min
Air and bone thresholds, speech testing, and middle-ear measures. Most tinnitus sits on top of a hearing loss, and the shape of that loss changes what will help.
- Pitch and loudness matching, where it is useful10 min
We find the frequency and level your tinnitus most closely matches. It is not a severity score. It is a starting point for sound therapy and a way to track change.
- We go through what we found, the same visit20 min
What is causing it if we can tell, what it is not, and which of the options actually apply to you: amplification, sound therapy, tinnitus retraining, Lenire, or a referral.
- A plan you leave with
Written down, with the next appointment booked if you need one. Habituation is a course of care over months, not a device you are handed at the door.
A tinnitus evaluation is a diagnostic appointment, so it is billed to your medical insurance in the same way a hearing test is. We check your benefits before the visit and tell you what your plan covers.
Frequently asked questions
Questions patients ask us
Can you share specific patient success stories?
We choose not to publish invented or embellished testimonials. Instead we describe the realistic patterns of relief people tend to experience, and we invite you to read genuine, unedited feedback on our reviews page.
How will I know the plan is working?
You sleep better first. Then the sound comes up less often, and it stops landing as hard when it does. It rarely disappears outright. We ask about all three at your review appointments, because people are poor judges of their own progress here and usually underestimate it.
Is improvement guaranteed?
No. Outcomes depend on your hearing, on your tinnitus profile, and on whether the plan gets followed. Plenty of the people we work with reach a point where the tinnitus no longer shapes their day. We cannot tell you in advance whether you will be one of them, and anyone who does tell you that is guessing.