Hearing Abilities at Ultra-High Frequency in Patients with Tinnitus

OBJECTIVES: To compare tinnitus patients who have normal hearing between 250 Hz and 8 kHz with normal controls with regard to the ability of each group to hear extended high-frequency pure tone thresholds. METHODS: We enrolled 18 tinnitus patients, each of whom had a threshold of HL <25 dB and threshold differences of <10 dB between ears at frequencies of 250 and 500 Hz and 1, 2, 4, and 8 kHz. We also enrolled age- and gender-matched normal volunteers (10 ears), for each patient. Extended high frequency pure tone audiometry was performed, and the mean hearing thresholds at 10, 12, 14, and 16 kHz of each tinnitus ear were compared with those of the 10 age- and sex-matched normal ears. RESULTS: Of the 18 patients with tinnitus, 12 had significantly increased hearing thresholds at more than one of the four high frequencies, compared with the normal group. When we assessed results according to frequency, we found that 8 patients had decreased hearing ability at 10 kHz, 10 at 12 kHz, 8 at 14 kHz, and 4 at 16 kHz. CONCLUSION: Some patients with tinnitus who have normal hearing below 8 kHz have decreased hearing ability at extended high-frequencies. Thus, the proportion of patients with tinnitus who have normal hearing over the entire audible range is smaller than in previous reports.