Platform for Tinnitus Reproduction and Control
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Platform for Tinnitus Reproduction and Control
IRAS ID
172258
Contact name
Stephanie Bertet
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
QUB
Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier
N/A, N/A
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, months, days
Research summary
Subjective tinnitus is described as being the perception of a sound without any external or internal auditory stimulation. It is impossible to record with a microphone or acquire a fully automatic characterization of the tinnitus. As long as the causes that generate a tinnitus remain unclear, the spectral reproduction of tinnitus will need to be patient led. Knowing the spectral characteristics of tinnitus and how it evolves over time would be of great help to understand its behavior, identify areas in the auditory system exhibiting the tinnitus-related abnormality and elucidate the mechanisms of tinnitus generation. Several ways of characterising tinnitus have been developed in the past, however the task of finding the exact signal that imitates the tinnitus is often tedious and does not necessarily obtain expected results, especially if the task is repeated over time.
The present project will implement ways of replicating a synthetic tinnitus using an iterative process. The proposed platform will invite users to perform playful tasks and guide them to, ultimately, reliably design a synthetic tinnitus that matchs their own tinnitus. The different tasks will be first tested on listeners that do not have tinnitus, then on people suffering from established subjective tinnitus.
This project has been submitted to the American Tinnitus Association for funding.
If this feasibility study proves to give reliable results, further research will be carry on to disseminate the software to new controlled environment, such as other research laboratories.REC name
Wales REC 6
REC reference
15/WA/0052
Date of REC Opinion
17 Feb 2015
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion