Personalized, app-based digital therapeutic for tinnitus ‘life-changing’
Patients with tinnitus who used a digital therapeutic system that combines goal-based counseling with personalized sound therapy showed clinically significant improvement after 12 weeks, researchers reported in Frontiers in Neurology.
“Sixty-five percent of participants reported an improvement,” Philip J. Sanders, PhD, co-author and research fellow at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, said in a university release. “For some people, it was life-changing — where tinnitus was taking over their lives and attention.”
Sanders and Grant D. Searchfield, PhD, associate professor of audiology and director of the university’s Hearing and Tinnitus Clinic, conducted a randomized, single-blind controlled trial to compare the efficacy of a digital therapeutic prototype with a passive sound therapy app. The prototype system, which included a smartphone app, Bluetooth bone conduction headphones and neck pillow speaker, and written counseling materials, could be partially controlled by the researchers and contained personalized functionalities and content for the user.
“Earlier trials have found white noise, goal-based counseling, goal-oriented games and other technology-based therapies are effective for some people some of the time,” Searchfield said in the release.
Researchers randomized 61 patients with chronic, moderate to severe tinnitus, assigning 31 participants to the digital therapeutic prototype and 30 to the white noise control app. The primary study outcome was change in Tinnitus Function Index (TFI) between baseline and 12 weeks of treatment.
According to results, mean changes in TFI for the prototype group were clinically meaningful (> 13 points reduction) at 6 (16.36 points) and 12 weeks (17.83 points), whereas the mean change for the control group was not (10.77 points, 6 weeks; 10.12 points, 12 weeks).
“This is more significant than some of our earlier work and is likely to have a direct impact on future treatment of tinnitus,” Searchfield said. “This is quicker and more effective, taking 12 weeks rather than 12 months for more individuals to gain some control.”
He added that the digital therapeutic prototype “essentially rewire[s] the brain,” and deescalates the sound of tinnitus to a background noise that has no meaning or relevance to the patient.
The researchers aim to refine the prototype for larger trials and eventually seek FDA approval, the release stated.
Reference:
Breakthrough in search for tinnitus cure. https://www.auckland.ac.nz/en/news/2022/08/09/breakthrough-in-search-for-tinnitus-cure.html. Published Aug. 9, 2022. Accessed Aug. 12, 2022.