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Tinnitus Cure Breakthrough Found With Digital Therapeutic
Researchers at the University of Auckland have advanced the search for a tinnitus cure, finding “encouraging results” using mobile-phone-based therapy, according to a study published in Frontiers in Neurology.
“The intervention tested in this research is a step toward an effective digital polytherapeutic that can accommodate individual goals and predictors of therapy success by employing multiple strategies to modify the neural networks underpinning tinnitus perception and distress,” researchers Grant D Searchfield, PhD, and Philip J Sanders, PhD, noted.
In this study, researchers wanted to examine if a prototype digital therapeutic with personalized game-based sound therapy would improve patients’ tinnitus better than a popular white noise app with similar usability.
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Researchers used a digital therapeutic consisting of a smartphone app, bone conduction headphones, and neck pillow speakers on study participants over 12 weeks to monitor how patients’ Tinnitus Functional Index (TFI) scores changed. The control group used a popular passive sound therapy app called White Noise Lite (WN). The 98 participants had chronic moderate-severe tinnitus—based on a TFI score greater than 40 for more than 6 months. Thirty-one participants in the experiment group and 30 in the WN group completed all 12 trial weeks.
Mean changes in TFI scores for the experiment group were clinically meaningful—greater than 13 points reduction—while the control group’s scores were not. After 12 weeks, 65% of experiment participants saw meaningful TFI change versus 43% of the control group.
“A goal of future iterations of the therapeutic is to further empower the individual with a sense of greater control over their tinnitus,” researchers concluded. “We believe that greater personalization and interaction in therapy selection (including therapeutic sounds) will enhance this sense of control.”
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