Page 9 - Portuguese Journal - SPORL - Vol 61. Nº1

Table 1
Tinnitus Handicap Inventory 20,21

Degree of severity of tinnitus Characterization
Grade 1 (0-16) – Very mild Is perceived only in silence. Without evident disturbances.
Easily masked by environmental sounds and forgotten during
Grade 2 (18-36) – Mild
daily activities. It may occasionally interfere with sleep.
Perceived even in environments with some sound. Daily activities
Grade 3 (38-56) – Moderate
are not impaired; interferes with sleep and with silent activities.
Interferes with almost all daily activities, especially with those
Grade 4 (58-76) – Severe
carried out in silent environments.
All symptoms associated with tinnitus are present and the
Grade 5 (78-100) – Catastrophic
associated psychopathology is eventually present.

within less than 72 h. In the absence of a pure- and after completing the proposed number of
tone audiogram performed before the hearing treatments. Auditory acuity improvement was
loss or history of asymmetric hypoacusis, classified according to Siegel’s classification
the pure tone average (PTA – mean of the criteria . The created database included
19
auditory thresholds in the 500, 1k, 2k, and 4k demographic and clinical data (sex, age,
frequencies) of the contralateral ear has been unilaterality/bilaterality, and affected ear),
defined as the baseline value. PTA has been the interval of time between the onset of
quantified as 110 dB in the case of cophosis. symptoms and the start of HOT, initial and
The HOT protocol included a mean of 20 final PTA, and initial and final THI scores.
sessions at 2.5 ATM for 90 minutes. After 10 The statistical analysis was performed using
treatment sessions, clinical evaluation and the IBM SPSS Statistics 26 software . The
audiometry tests were performed. statistical significance level was set at p<0.05.
All patients who had not completed the Pearson’s and Student’s t-test were used for
number of treatments proposed by the correlation analysis.
physician (due to complications or patient
drop out) were excluded. Results
The Tinnitus Handicap Inventory (THI) was Of the 57 patients included in the study, 52
used for the qualitative evaluation of tinnitus (91%) had unilateral sudden hearing loss and
and its impact on the patient’s quality of five (8.8%) had bilateral hearing loss. The
life, before and after treatment with HOT participants’ age varied between 25 and 78
(questionnaire for the qualitative evaluation years (mean of 51 years); 50.8% of the patients
of the impact of tinnitus on the patient’s were women and 49.2% were men.
quality of life). All patients underwent The interval of time between the onset of
audiometry and tympanometry tests before symptoms and start of HOT was 7 to 103 days

Table 2
Siegel’s Classification Criteria

Siegel’s Classification Criteria 19
Complete recovery Final PTA <25 dB
Partial recovery PTA gain >15 dB and final PTA between 25 and 45 dB
Slight recovery PTA gain >15 dB and final PTA >45 dB
No improvement PTA gain <15 dB

Abbreviation: PTA, pu re tone average

Volume 61 . Nº1 . March 2023 9