You Know when you’re watching an action movie and the hero has a thunderous explosion close by and their ears start ringing? Well, at least some amount of mild brain trauma has likely happened to them.
Obviously, action movies don’t highlight the brain injury part. But that high-pitched ringing is something known as tinnitus. Normally, hearing loss is the topic of a tinnitus conversation, but traumatic brain injuries can also cause this condition.
Concussions, after all, are one of the most prevalent traumatic brain injuries that occur. And they can happen for a wide variety of reasons (for instance, falls, sports accidents, and motor vehicle crashes). How something like a concussion causes tinnitus can be, well, complicated. But here’s the good news: even if you sustain a brain injury that triggers tinnitus, you can normally treat and manage your condition.
What is a concussion?
A concussion is a particular form of traumatic brain injury (TBI). Think about it this way: your brain is situated pretty tightly into your skull (your brain is big, and your skull is there to protect it). The brain will start to move around inside your skull when something shakes your head violently. But your brain could end up crashing into the inside of your skull because of the small amount of additional space in there.
This causes harm to your brain! The brain can impact one or more sides of your skull. And when this happens, you experience a concussion. When you visualize this, it makes it easy to understand how a concussion is literally brain damage. Symptoms of concussions include the following:
- Ringing in the ears
- Blurry vision or dizziness
- Loss of memory and confusion
- Nausea and vomiting
- A slow or delayed response to questions
- Headaches
- Slurred speech
This list isn’t exhaustive, but you get the point. Symptoms from a concussion can last anywhere between several weeks and a few months. Brain damage from one concussion is generally not permanent, most individuals will end up making a total recovery. But repeated concussions can result in irreversible brain damage.
How is tinnitus caused by a concussion?
Can a concussion interfere with your hearing? Really?
It’s an intriguing question: what is the connection between concussions and tinnitus? Because it’s more accurate to say that traumatic brain injuries (even minor ones) can cause tinnitus, it’s not only concussions. Even mild brain injuries can result in that ringing in your ears. Here are a few ways that could happen:
- Interruption of the Ossicular Chain: The relaying of sound to your brain is assisted by three bones in your ear. A major impact (the type that can trigger a concussion, for instance) can jostle these bones out of place. This can disrupt your ability to hear and result in tinnitus.
- Meniere’s Syndrome: The onset of a condition known as Meniere’s Syndrome can be caused by a TBI. When pressure builds up in the inner ear this condition can happen. Sooner or later, Meniere’s syndrome can result in noticeable tinnitus and hearing loss.
- Damage to your hearing: Enduring an explosion at close distance is the cause of concussions and TBIs for lots of members of the military. Permanent hearing loss can be triggered when the stereocilia in your ears are injured by the incredibly noisy shock wave of an explosion. So it’s not so much that the concussion caused tinnitus, it’s that the tinnitus and concussion have the same underlying cause.
- Nerve damage: There’s also a nerve that is responsible for transmitting sounds you hear to your brain, which a concussion can harm.
- Disruption of communication: Concussion can, in some instances, damage the portions of the brain that control hearing. Consequently, the signals sent from the ear to your brain can’t be correctly digested and tinnitus can result.
- A “labyrinthine” concussion: This form of concussion occurs when the inner ear is injured as a result of your TBI. This damage can produce inflammation and cause both hearing loss and tinnitus.
Of course it’s significant to keep in mind that no two brain injuries are exactly the same. Every patient will get individualized care and instructions from us. You should certainly call us for an assessment if you think you might have suffered a traumatic brain injury.
When you suffer from a concussion and tinnitus is the consequence, how can it be treated?
Typically, it will be a temporary situation if tinnitus is the consequence of a concussion. How long can tinnitus linger after a concussion? Well, it might last weeks or possibly months. Then again, if your tinnitus has lingered for more than a year, it’s likely to be long lasting. Over time, in these situations, treatment plans to manage your condition will be the best plan.
Here are some ways to accomplish this:
- Therapy: In some situations, therapy, including Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) can be utilized to help patients disregard the noise caused by their tinnitus. You ignore the sound after acknowledging it. It will take some therapy, practice, and time though.
- Hearing aid: In a similar way to when you have hearing loss not triggered by a TBI, tinnitus symptoms seem louder because everything else is quieter. A hearing aid can help turn the volume up on everything else, assuring that your tinnitus fades into the background.
- Masking device: This device is similar to a hearing aid, only instead of helping you hear things louder, it creates a particular noise in your ear. Your particular tinnitus symptoms determine what sound the device will produce helping you disregard the tinnitus sounds and be better able to pay attention to voices and other outside sounds.
Obtaining the expected result will, in some situations, require added therapies. Clearing up the tinnitus will frequently call for treatment to the root concussion. The right course of action will depend on the status of your concussion and your TBI. This means an accurate diagnosis is incredibly important in this regard.
Consult us about what the right treatment plan may look like for you.
TBI-triggered tinnitus can be managed
Your life can be traumatically affected by a concussion. When you get a concussion, it’s a bad day! And if you’ve been in a car crash and your ears are ringing, you may wonder why.
It could be days later or immediately after the crash that tinnitus symptoms surface. However, it’s essential to remember that tinnitus after a head injury can be successfully managed. Schedule a consultation with us right away.