Question: Most of us here are aware that aspirin is actually considered a major contributor to tinnitus.

However, I have been taking at least one standard (five grain) aspirin every day now for the past 5 months.

This is doctors's orders, for possible protection from any heart condition. There is a history of heart disease in my family.

This may come as a surprise, but I have noticed a significant decrease in the loudness and intensity of my tinnitus during the past month or so!

I now remember that when I was first stricken with tinnitus in 1996, that my otologist at Manhattan, Eye, Ear, and Throat hospital in NYC, told me that there were some studies going on with "low-dose" aspirin as a treatment for tinnitus.

Is anyone here familiar with any of these studies?

Aspirin & Tinnitus HELPS

Answer: Aspirin contains salicylate, and its effect of temporarily aggravating or causing tinnitus has been known about for many years. Salicylate is recognised as an ototoxic drug. It can induce reversible hearing loss and tinnitus, probably by its action on the outer hair cell system of the cochlea (inner ear). It sometimes causes side-effects such as ringing in the ears, nausea, stomach ache, dizziness, and sweating. You will only suffer permanent damage if you take fairly large doses for quite a long time. In most cases, tinnitus caused by aspirin disappears once you stop taking the aspirin.

People who already have tinnitus may find that taking aspirin aggravates it. Small doses such as a quarter tablet (75mg) per day are unlikely to produce any permanent change in tinnitus for most people. If you take aspirin regularly for headaches or minor complaints, it may be worth changing to a non-salicylate drug such as paracetamol.

If you suspect that aspirin (or another drug containing salicylate) may be making your tinnitus worse, talk to your doctor or pharmacist about the possibility of changing to some other medication. If it seems that aspirin is worsening your tinnitus, you may have to weigh up the beneficial effect of the aspirin on the condition you are taking it for against any increase in your tinnitus. If your GP has prescribed aspirin for you, always discuss changing the dosage with him or her before you go ahead. Aspirin is also available in buffered or coated form. If you take it this way, or with food, you may reduce any adverse effects.

There are many other factors that can influence tinnitus, and it may be that your tinnitus is being affected by these rather than by the aspirin. Stress, anxiety, illness, infection, other drugs, and some foods and drinks can all increase tinnitus noises for some people.

Aspirin as a treatment for a certain type of tinnitus

For a few people - probably no more than one per cent of tinnitus patients seen in hospitals - tinnitus seems to be due to spontaneous oto-acoustic emissions (SOAES). This is where the cochlea seems actively to produce sounds that can actually be recorded by sensitive microphones placed in the ear. Aspirin has been used in a handful of small-scale trials to treat this rare type of tinnitus with some success. Why aspirin should work in these cases is unclear. It may have an ototoxic effect on cochlear hair cells that is similar to the effect it has when it causes tinnitus. For this reason, it is not a good idea to experiment on yourself with aspirin. For this treatment, you must be tested by a hospital clinic that has the specialist sensitive equipment to find out if you have SOAE tinnitus...