by Neil Bauman, Ph.D.
According to an animal study at the University of Michigan, “a combination of high doses of vitamins A, C and E and magnesium, taken one hour before noise exposure and continued as a once-daily treatment for five days, was very effective at preventing permanent noise-induced hearing loss.” (1)
Here’s why researchers think this works. They feel that one of the major factors causing hearing loss from loud noise is excessive free radical activity. “Scientists have learned that noise-induced hearing loss occurs, in part, because cell mitochondria in the inner ear churn out damaging free radicals in response to loud sounds.”
Think of these free radicals as tiny enemy bullets. If they fatally damage a cell, it goes into a process called apotosis—in which the cell systematically shuts itself down and dies. If those cells are the hair cells in your inner ears, then you lose hearing when those hair cells die. Thus, it is important to zap the free radicals before they do their dastardly deeds.
The anti-oxidant vitamins are the “good guys”. They act as tiny missiles that shoot down the free radical bullets before they can cause any damage.
In addition to the vitamins A, C and E, your body makes a powerful antioxidant called glutathione. (This above study didn’t include glutathione, but it should have.) You see, “glutathione is considered the most powerful natural antioxidant there is. Your body makes this antioxidant naturally from compounds such as N-acetyl-cysteine and D-methionine which in turn are made from three amino acids-cysteine, glycine and glutamic acid. When your ears need extra help, taking N-acetyl-cysteine and D-methionine helps your body quickly make more glutathione.” (2)
“According to the researchers, pre-treatment [with vitamins A, C and E and magnesium] presumably reduced the free radicals that form during and after noise exposure, and noise-induced constriction of blood flow to the inner ear, and may have also reduced neural excitotoxicity, or the damage to auditory neurons that can occur due to over-stimulation. The post- noise nutrient doses apparently “scavenged” free radicals that continue to form long after this noise exposure ends.” (1)
That magnesium helps our ears is nothing new. Back in 2005 I wrote, “In addition, researchers now know that the mineral magnesium plays an important part in hearing. Scientists have found that a magnesium deficiency increases susceptibility to noise damage. One of the things that happens is the lack of magnesium causes the tiny blood vessels in your ears to constrict, thus depriving them of an adequate supply of oxygen. At the same time, loud noise depletes your ears of magnesium—so loud noise actually causes a double-whammy. There is evidence that high doses of magnesium taken soon after a sudden hearing loss can sometimes help restore hearing.” (2)
The University of Michigan has applied for patents covering the use of this combination of vitamins and minerals. However, you don’t have to take their patented formulation if you don’t want to. Just make sure you are taking adequate daily doses of vitamins A, C and E, and magnesium supplements, and you will get essentially the same protection.
You can get all of the above in almost any good health food store for a fraction of what you will likely have to pay for the patented formulations. Furthermore, when you get your own supplements, you can tailor the amounts you take of each supplement to fit your own body chemistry and lifestyle.
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After having said all this, don’t be stupid and deliberately expose your ears to loud sounds thinking that you can always zap the free radicals with the various things named above. These nutrients help, but they don’t do a perfect job. You will likely still experience some degree of ear damage.
Thus, If you are around noisy machinery, use loud lawnmowers and leaf blowers, ride noisy recreational vehicles such as motorcycles and snowmobiles, go to loud sports venues or loud concerts, in addition to taking your vitamins and glutathione, etc., Wear ear protectors. The little foam ones available at most drugstores for a few bucks go a long ways towards protecting your ears from the results of excessive noise.
(1) “Nutrients might prevent hearing loss in war zones, concert halls & workplaces, new animal study suggests” by Anne Reuter, 2007. University of Michigan Health System.
(2) “Loud Music and Hearing Loss” by Neil Bauman, 2005.
As a former rocker I did my ears in before I was 21. Though I think my hearing is not so good, the ear clinic said I was OK except for tinnitus. (Yet, hearing tests are conducted in a silent environment – while most of my hearing problems occur at group events that are quire noisy.)
I have increased my dietary magnesium and don’t see much difference, but it seems not to be a big help after the damage is done.
Thanks for the postings.
I am 34 years old man with sudden hearing loss during a night. initially I have vertigo, tinnitus and vomiting and now, after three weeks I have tinnitus and hearing loss from left ear.Doctor prescribed dexamethasone (IM) every 3 days and betahistine hydrochloride for me but I have hearing loss and tinnitus now.please guidance me.
Hi Mohammad:
I’m not sure what guidance you are looking for. Your doctor is treating you, but there are no guarantees that your hearing will ever come back. My rule of thumb is that whatever hearing you have at the end of 30 days is likely what you will be left with.
After 30 days or so, it is time to switch from treatment mode to learning to live with your hearing loss and tinnitus.
There are many coping strategies you can use that will help you successfully live with your hearing loss and tinnitus. You can read numerous articles on this website on these subjects.
I wish you well.
Neil
This is an excellent article. I know about how wonderful mg is because it basically saved my back. But I had forgotten about loud noises causing a loss of mg. And just recently doctors have been discussing that loud noises are bad for our hearts. It’s understandable since we lose magnesium with loud noises.
Dr. Neil, I have a friend who has tinnitis, I think it is, and doesn’t magnesium help this too? Also, D-methionine, what supplement is this and where can it be found?
I cringe every time thinking back to when I was younger, going to those loud concerts. I’m sure that my hearing was damaged from at least one back in 1975.
Thanks
I have a son who is mentally impaired. He has had frequent ear infections and fluid in in ears most of his life ( he is now 27) He has a 70% hearing loss in one ear and 30% in the other. They are now telling me he needs hearing aids in both ears.
Would taking magnesium help him at this point? Also,
how do you pick a good hearing aid?
Look forward in hearing from you.
Thank you,
Mary Ann
Guys, please take magnisium and vit D3, together they help.
I had most of the ear symptoms, tinnitus, retrcted timpannum,patalous ear, dysfunctional eusan tube, outdoor allerg affecting hearing, food allergy affecting hearing. I had up to 90% hearling loss.
Magnisium and vitamin D3 together helped me. Magnisium alone did not work. This was a chance discovery for me.
Hello Dr Neil -Thank you for all you are doing to help those of us suffering with Tinnitus. I have had horrendous tinnitus since October and the sounds, severity, pressure can be very maddening. I took .5-10mg of Klonopin for about a year to help with my insomnia and realized I had developed severe tinnitus. I stopped taking the drug and take valerian, magnesium, chamomile, etc. to help me fall asleep now. Sleepy Tea works great too and then a fan to mask the high pitch sounds. Is it ok to use ear buds as I would have to turn up the fan really loud to mask the tinnitus. Can Klonopin cause tinnitus?
TY,
Michelle
Hi Michelle:
Although Clonazepam (Klonopin) mostly causes vestibular side effects, and is not listed as causing tinnitus, at least 46 people have reported to the FDA that taking Clonazepam caused their tinnitus. So I have no reason to doubt that your tinnitus was caused by the Clonazepam.
As to wearing ear buds to mask your tinnitus, you don’t have to completely mask your tinnitus to get some benefit from the fan–you just need enough sound to give your ears real sounds to focus on. If you want to wear ear buds, the same rules apply as to listening to any sounds, keep the level below 80 dB and even that may be too loud if you are going to be listening to it all night. A good rule of thumb is to play the sounds at the same level as you hear the average person talking–which should be more like around 55 to 60 dB or so.
Cordially,
Neil
Hi!
I had noise damage from acoustic shock from 3 weeks now.My left ear is more affected(i also have tinnitus in my left ear).And i also have hyperacusis(not very bad).Can any of this treatments(magnesium,vitamin A,C,E) help recover my slightly hearing loss?
Sorry for my english 🙂
Hi Lucian:
It would have been better to begin to take the vitamins and minerals as soon after the incident as possible. I can’t say they will help all that much now, but taking them certainly won’t hurt and may do some good. The only way to tell is to take them and see whether it makes a positive difference.
Cordially,
Neil
hello doctor, I was diagnosed with tinnitus in January, I realized i had ringing in my ears when i had fallen from stairs and was on bed rest due to spinal injury. the doctors prescribed. ginko biloba, neurozan and some vitamins like d3. for 20 days. I didn’t see much difference though. I still have tinnitus and some pain in my left ear. its been 5 months since i last took the medicine. my hearing in left ear is somewhere near 20db(as in January). will it get worse? would you suggest me to take magnesium with Vit A C and E?
Hi Amy:
How soon after you fell did you notice your tinnitus? I’m trying to figure out whether your tinnitus was a result of the fall, a result of drugs you took since the fall, or some other cause such as hearing loss from the fall, etc.
Before you know whether it is going to be effective, Ginkgo biloba needs to be taken for 3 months, not just 20 days. Furthermore, were you taking an effective dose. An effective dose would be 480 mg per day. Often people don’t take near enough Ginkgo to be effective.
I wonder whether your neck is out of proper alignment from the fall–specifically the top two vertebrae. If I were you, I’d go to an upper cervical spine chiropractor to be checked out. It could be something that simple.
If you hearing hasn’t changed in the past 5 months, I don’t think it will change in the future–apart from getting worse as you age (which happens to many people).
You can try the magnesium, A, C and E, but since it has been at least 5 months since the incident, I wouldn’t expect much change–unless you are really deficient in these vitamins and minerals.
Cordially,
Neil
thank you so much for your reply.
I am not really sure if it was after the fall. I just noticed after it because i used to be on bed the whole day in silence. It was then that i realized i have this noise the whole time n not just at night .
I am 32 years old. I got few tests done before the fall and i lacked in vitamin D3. it was barely there … and vitamin c id try getting myself checked by a chiropractor.
Hi Amy:
Being in an unusually quiet environment can bring on tinnitus too. So having some background sounds–music, fan or other source of sounds can be very beneficial in treating tinnitus so your brain has other real sounds to listen to and that can be enough to make your tinnitus fade into the background.
Cordially,
Neil
But yea, the moment i had fallen i had a serious chilling sensation in my head and forehead. Just in case this seems to be something related.
Hi! I went to the ENT this week and found out I have acoustic trauma to the ear due to a handheld whistle blow tonthe ear directly. Is there anything that can be done or taken to help with the ringing, buzzing, transmitter like noises I hear when I talk and walk or move my head certain ways?
Hi Trista:
I’d certainly try taking N-acetyl-cysteine (NAC) and zinc and magnesium to help your hears recover and block free radicals from making things worse. (See my article at http://hearinglosshelp.com/blog/loud-music-and-hearing-loss/ for more on NAC.)
I’d give your ears a rest from any louder sounds for the next month or two. Acoustic trauma takes time to heal. After a couple of months, if you still have problems let me know. In the meantime, don’t focus on your tinnitus–this will only make it worse. Learn to ignore your tinnitus by focusing on the loves of your life instead and let your tinnitus fade into the background.
Cordially,
Neil
Hi! Thank you for your response. I am having a very hard time dealing with it and learning how to handle it. I am also dealing with a cold or allergies of some sort. Could that be making the condition worse?
Also could it cause the trauma to not be able to heal?
Hi Trista:
Colds and allergies can certainly cause tinnitus/make it worse as they can cause some degree of hearing loss and tinnitus generally accompanies hearing loss.
Whether your tinnitus persists largely depends on you. In order for your tinnitus to go away, you may have to learn to ignore your tinnitus and not think bad things about it. Just treat it as a totally useless, unimportant background sound. This gives your limbic system permission to let it fade into the background where it will not be a problem.
I’ve had tinnitus for more than 65 years now, but it is no big deal. It is just “there”. And hours go by without my even being aware I have tinnitus. But whenever I think about it, wham, there it is. Like right now for instance. When I began writing this reply to you, suddenly my tinnitus is there in both ears–ringing away. Now, here’s the good news. Within 5 minutes of my going on to some other subject, I won’t even be aware I have tinnitus. That’s how habituated I am to my tinnitus. So whether I can hear my tinnitus or not makes no difference. As I said, it’s just no big deal. You can learn to do the same if your tinnitus doesn’t fade away on its own.
My book, “Take Control of Your Tinnitus” explains all about tinnitus. Chapter 16 shows you how to let it fade away so it no longer bothers you. You can get this book at http://hearinglosshelp.com/shop/take-control-of-your-tinnitus-heres-how/
Cordially,
Neil
Thank you! I went back to my family doctor and I now have a sinus infection. I am hoping that once all this subsides, that the noise volume will go away some of all the way away. I am trying my best to not think about it and push past it. It has been really hard.
Hi again! Which vitamins can I get at the store can help with tinnitus along with taking antibiotics and a non addicting anxiety medicine? And how much of each dose can be taken?
Dr. Neil,
I have had tinnitus for about 10 years after attending a concert. I was told I likely had an inner ear concussion. I was given steroids, but the ringing remained. I got used to it and lived quite happily ever since, always protecting my ears from that point forward when I would attend concerts. The ringing was fairly quite and consistent for the most part, never changing tone or volume.
About six months ago, I was listening to music in my car, quite loud, and the tinnitus came back with a vengeance. I was extremely distraught, went to a doctor, got a hearing test and they said I had no hearing loss. I got a steroid treatment, but it did not help much. Unlike before, it constantly changes tone /volume and is different every single day. This made it very difficult to habituate like I had before. Luckily, over the past six months it continued to fade gradually and was actually getting to the point where I wasn’t noticing it much anymore.
Then, two days a go, I went and saw the new Star Wars movie in IMAX. The theater was extremely loud. I did not bring ear protection and just hoped it was not too loud to cause damage. The next day(yesterday), my tinnitus was very loud again and Ibegan to panic. I am very distraught about this.
I have actually been taking magnesium supplements for the past week, due to my wife’s recommendation. This was before I saw the movie. Last night I was freaking out and she gave me a blood pressure pill, as she took my blood pressure and said it was very high. Shortly after I took the pill, my tinnitus dropped in volume considerably.
Do you have any advice as to what I should do? I am continuing to take the magnesium supplements, but I fear I may have put myself back to square one, where I was 6 months ago, and it is very depressing. I am thinking of going to the doctor again, but I did not find them to be much help. I went to two different doctors with the same result. They just told me to live with it and did not offer any other advice on how to deal with this. Any advice you can provide would be greatly appreciated as I am very scared for my hearing at the moment.
I am a male. 41 years of age.
Hi Randy:
Whenever you expose your ears to loud sounds, you can expect to be thrown back to the starting line once more. Your ears are not as “robust” as they once were so they cannot tolerate loud sounds like they used to. Thus, in the future you NEED to always protect your ears from such loud sounds. It would be a good idea to ALWAYS carry a pair of foam ear protectors with you, then when you find yourself in a too loud for your ears environment, you can pull them out and wear them. The alternatives are either you have to quickly leave the loud venue, or head back to square one afterwards.
Since you know how to habituate to your tinnitus, you can try it again. It is a slow process and starting at square 1 again is discouraging to be sure. But hopefully this time you’ll remember that you NEED to protect your ears from loud sounds.
I’d just start over again and persevere. You should be able to habituate again in time.
Like you say, doctors are basically clueless in helping people with tinnitus. He just might try to push drugs on you and they are not the answer. They can just make things worse as most of the drugs they prescribe can give you tinnitus or make existing tinnitus worse.
Going forward, do the things you did before to allow you to habituate to your tinnitus. Don’t focus on your tinnitus, instead, focus on the loves of your life. Don’t form any negative emotional reactions to your tinnitus, instead, treat it as a totally unimportant background sound that you can safely ignore, then do that. When you do this, it gives your limbic system permission to not bring your tinnitus to your attention–and this begins the slow process of habituating to your tinnitus.
Being scared and focusing on your tinnitus tells you limbic system that tinnitus is an important sound and cannot be ignored so it makes your tinnitus louder and more intrusive–the opposite of what you want to happen. Chapter 16 in my book on tinnitus gives you some very practical ways to do this. You can get it at https://hearinglosshelp.com/shop/take-control-of-your-tinnitus-heres-how/
Cordially,
Neil
Hi Neil,
I shot a rifle Skeet shooting about 3 days ago using ear plugs. My ears didn’t bother me while doing it, in fact, it wasn’t until I got home that I realized my right ear felt clogged. Luckily, I found this website and started taking NAC the following day (less than 24 hours after using the rifle). I coupled it with magnesium, vitamin C, zinc and Vitamin D. It’s been about 75 hours and my right ear still feels clogged. Like when an airplane lands. My hearing seems totally fine. There’s some slight Tinnitus but that isn’t the part that’s bothering me. How long will this plugged up feeling last? It’s really frustrating. Should I see an ENT? Or continue these vitamins and wait things out and hope to heal?
Hi Chrissy:
The interesting thing about short sudden sounds like rifle shots is that you don’t necessarily see the side effects right away. You may, but it is common for them to show up later–up to 2 or 3 days later.
The plugged feeling is from your tensor tympani muscle pulling on your Eustachian tube so it doesn’t work properly. This will go away eventually, but it may take a few months.
You’ve done all the good things you can do. Now you just need to make sure you are not around loud sounds–particularly sudden, unexpected loud sounds–and give your ears a chance to heal for the next couple of months.
I wouldn’t bother with the ENT because he’ll run some tests, then tell you your hearing is fine–and you already know that. He may give you a decongestant to supposedly clear your Eustachian tube–but it is not congested. So if it were me, I’d save my money and wait it out. Oh, and don’t get anxious and worry over it. That will just make it stick around and if you worry enough, it will get worse.
Hopefully, you’ll start to notice things getting better in a week or two, but it can take much longer, but it will go away.
Cordially,
Neil