Characteristics of tinnitus and related observations in over 1800 tinnitus clinic patients

This report has provided a brief survey of the Tinnitus Clinic population as it appeared near the end of 1981, when 1806 patients had been seen. That number is probably sufficient to provide satisfactory statistical reliability for the observations cited here. It should be mentioned that the Tinnitus Clinic has continued to accumulate cases, at the approximate rate of 30 per month, and at this writing the total number of patients seen to date is over 2300. The data obtained from the first 1806 patients were collected under conditions that were not as homogeneous as those prevailing now, in that standardized testing equipment was not available until January 1979, and testing techniques were continuing to be revised even after that time. In addition a major revision of the patient questionnaires was undertaken late in 1981, with the result that much more detailed information is being obtained than was formerly possible using the old questionnaire format. Thus, we can anticipate that the next such survey of the Tinnitus Clinic population will offer considerably expanded and more detailed types of observations than those presented here.