Based on the research conducted by Dr. Aazh’s tinnitus team, 19% of the patients describe their tinnitus as buzzing noise, 12% as high-pitched noise, 12% as hissing noise, 12% as whistle, 10% as waterfall and grinding wheel, 2% as ringing, 2% as white noise, 2% as wind noise, 2% as aeroplane taking off, 2% as bubbles and clicks, 2% as beep, 2% humming noise, and about 20% were not able to describe the sound of their tinnitus. Hyperacusis is intolerance to certain everyday sounds that causes significant distress and impairment in social, occupational, recreational, and other day-to-day activities. Intolerance to certain sounds related to eating noises, lip smacking, sniffing, breathing, clicking sounds, burping, sneezing, coughing, and tapping noises is also known as misophonia or annoyance hyperacusis.
Your first appointment typically involves an initial assessment of the severity of your symptoms, counselling and discussing a rehabilitative therapy programme that suits you. Appointments are typically 60 minutes and offered either face-to-face in our Guildford and London clinics or via Skype.
In the first consultation, an in-depth interview will be conducted in order to explore the impact of tinnitus/hyperacusis/misophonia on the patient’s day-to-day activities or mood and the underlying mechanism that these disturb the patient’s life. The information gathered via the in-depth interview in combination with the data collected from a wide range of questionnaires will be used in order to formulate a treatment programme if needed.
For many patients the initial consultation is all they might need. Patients and parents (in the paediatric clinic) report that the initial consultation was the most enlightening in helping them to understand how to move forward.
During the initial consultation the following tasks will be taken (For more description of the questionnaires used see the factsheet for psycho-audiological assessment.