The AudioNotch Tinnitus Treatment Blog

The subject of TMS as a treatment for tinnitus has come up multiple times on the AudioNotch blog.

Despite promising early small scale studies, we’ve repeatedly reviewed evidence that indicates that TransCranial Magnetic Stimulation is an ineffective treatment for tinnitus:

• Tinnitus Research: rTMS
• rTMS for Tinnitus: the latest 2014 research results
• A randomized controlled trial for rTMS as tinnitus treatment: what are the results?

TMS, as it is colloquially referred to (or Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation, which is the proper term) has recently been investigated as a possible treatment avenue for tinnitus. A lot patients get excited about TMS & tinnitus, but the results have not been good. People are attracted to TMS because it’s noninvasive (basically just a magnet held over your head) and thus doesn’t really appear to have any significant complications with use. It’s been used in depression as well, and the logic is that you could target the affected region of the brain non-invasively. … Continue Reading

Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation is a treatment that has been tested for tinnitus. There has been some promising literature with guided rTMS in the past. In the procedure, a magnet is used to modify neurons non-invasively, by holding it over a patient’s head. The technology has been used to treat depression.

A recent randomized controlled trial (considered the most high quality type of experiment) has shown that rTMS is not effective for tinnitus treatment:
Results: At none of the follow-up evaluation moments a significant difference between rTMS and placebo was observed with respect to changes in … Continue Reading

Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation Therapy (also known as rTMS) is a relatively new technology that has been used to treat a variety of brain based disorders, such as depression. It involves using a device to magnetically stimulate the brain non-invasively. Here is a link to an abstract of a paper that found evidence that it can be used to decrease tinnitus volume.

Regrettably, a review paper came to the following conclusion:
There is very limited support for the use of low-frequency rTMS for the treatment of patients with tinnitus. When considering the impact of tinnitus on patients’ quality of life, support is from a single … Continue Reading