7 ms·

I've been following tinnitus research and the most promising treatment is FX-322 [1]. It's a drug that will treat hearing loss, but it could also help diminish

by dasb 6y ago

I've been following tinnitus research and the most promising treatment is FX-322 [1]. It's a drug that will treat hearing loss, but it could also help diminish tinnitus. It's currently in phase 2a [2] and results come out next year [3]. [1] https://hear2tell.com/2020/09/29/frequency-therapeutics-fx-322-a-potential-hearing-loss-treatment-on-the-horizon/ https://hear2tell.com/2020/09/29/frequency-therapeutics-fx-3... [2] https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04120116 https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04120116 [3] https://www.hearinglosstreatmentreport.com/estimated-fx-322-phase-2a-study-completion-date-may-21-2021/ https://www.hearinglosstreatmentreport.com/estimated-fx-322-...

vagrantJin 6y ago
I get it when my right ear has way too much earwax. J lose some hearing and the ringing wont stop. Just a bit annoying so Im usually wearing headphones with nice soothing music until I can get that wax out.
- furyofantares 6y ago
  Are you using cotton swaps in your ears? What might be happening is that you shove wax in, clogging your ears and giving you tinnitus. That used to happen to me - the ear wax wasn't the problem, trying to clean it was.
  - modeless 6y ago
    To clean your ears yourself you need something like this: https://www.japantrendshop.com/coden-ear-scope-13000-standard-p-2756.html https://www.japantrendshop.com/coden-ear-scope-13000-standar... I thought it was ridiculous when I first saw it but I took a chance on it and it is actually a great product. You can clearly see everything and clean without damaging your ear. If you've ever had to go to the doctor to clear a blocked ear, you need one of these. With occasional use (~once/month) your ears will never be blocked again.
    - dmoy 6y ago
      Oh wow that is amazing I also get mild tinnitus for the last 6 or so years due to earwax (once it got completely blocked and I had to go to the doctor to have them irrigate it back out). I don't use cotton or any scraping right now, but I do use the same stuff the doctor used to irrigate it every once in awhile, to middling effect. Maybe I'll try out that ear scope thing.
      - jakear 6y ago
        I've had great success with the ~$20 ear pump devices available at your local drug store. They look like a normal squirt bottle with a tube tip, you fill it up with warm water and just keep squeezing. I'm not sure what the scope would do for me... I can hear the ear is clogged, I don't need a visual confirmation.
        dmoy 6y ago
        Yea that's pretty similar to what I'm currently using.
        modeless 6y ago
        I find that process uncomfortably loud, and I worry about damaging my ear with too much pressure. I also find it difficult to tell if it's working or if it's finished, especially if the ear is not plugged all the way yet, which I want to avoid. The endoscope is faster, easier, more comfortable, and makes it possible to clean when the ear is not actually plugged and verify that it worked.
        Fezzik 6y ago
        I have been using these at least twice a month since high-school (20+ years) after having multiple dramatic ear infections that rendered me temporally unable to hear due to clogging. I was just at the ENT doc last week and he confirmed that my ears 1) look and function great and 2) there is no damage, at all, from using these mini turkey baster like devices when they are used correctly. I highly recommend them, but your own experience may differ and you should probably check with an ENT doc just to be sure.
tstubben 6y ago
I'm also following FX-322 and keeping my fingers crossed that the trials result in a real significant effective treatment for my SSHL in my right ear. It would really be amazing!
patorjk 6y ago
Carl LeBel (Chief Development Officer of Frequency) revealed on the Tinnitus Talk Podcast that several patients in the Phase I/II study reported "improved" tinnitus to their ENTs. How much improvement wasn't measured, but it's one of the reasons they're testing for tinnitus in the phase 2a study. Otonomy's OTO-413 drug (to fix the ribbon synapses in the cochlea) also seems really promising (results are due out next month). However, for their phase I/II study they're not testing for tinnitus and are actually excluding patients with "bothersome tinnitus". I'm hoping they see the same thing as Frequency and that some patients report improved tinnitus. These two drugs together (regrowing hair cells and ribbon synapses) seem like they could be a good one-two punch against hearing loss and tinnitus.
meowface 6y ago
>The researchers found that some body tissues regenerate much better than others. They studied the lining of the small intestine, which turns over roughly every four days, because it’s designed to absorb and distribute nutrients to other parts of the body. Drs. Karp and Langer saw the molecular pathways that signal the lining’s cells to turn over quickly and form new tissues. >Around the same time, another scientific group found very similar cells in the cochlea – but with one big difference: in the cochlea, these cells weren’t active. They saw that the cochlea’s cells didn’t regenerate and form new sensory hair cells. “So that was the formation of Frequency,” LeBel explains. “And Frequency was asking, why is that the case? Why is it that the cochlea isn’t regenerating cells and the small intestine is?” >This led to the discovery of two small molecules that make up FX-322, which targets these cells, called progenitor cells. Essentially, this process is meant to drive hair cell regeneration: The drug targets pathways to those cochlear cells, and when activated, they divide and form a new cell of themselves, called daughter cells. “And then most importantly, they form a new sensory hair cell,” LeBel says. That sounds incredible. If it really can reliably do what they claim with no significant negative side effects, that'd seem like one of the most "miraculous" treatments I've heard of in a while, both in terms of the technique and what it could accomplish.
- lr4444lr 6y ago
  Yep. Frequency Therapeutics could make a tremendous medical breakthrough here. But some caution is warranted, even in light of their promising human trials: cochlear cell regeneration and subsequent hearing restoration is observed in reptiles and birds, so there is reason to believe that they can coax mammalian ears to do the same thing, but it may not be as generalizable a result across the human body. But damn will people start trying mightily if it succeeds in the ears. That said, even simply finding a cure for sensorineural hearing loss is nothing short of perhaps one of the top 10 medical breakthroughs in the last 50 years if you look at the cost to society and prevalence of it.
  - meowface 6y ago
    My baseless armchair speculative fear, with absolutely zero knowledge of this field or technology, is if some of the new hair cells could maybe somehow not fully "sync with" or complement the existing set and perhaps just make you hear "differently" but not necessarily better, and perhaps even worse in some contexts, depending on what % of your existing hair cells were healthy. I have no clue if that has any remote basis in reality, though. And perhaps your brain would eventually learn to sort it all out, so maybe any increased sensory sensitivity would generally be a net plus either way, once enough time passes.
pacomerh 6y ago
Thanks for the resources. I'm usually following https://www.tinnitustreatmentreport.com/ https://www.tinnitustreatmentreport.com/ for all things tinnitus and that's where I saw the FX-322
- urgentresearch 6y ago
  Tinnitus Treatment Report creator here. Glad you find the site useful and thank you for sharing the link. Appreciated.
urgentresearch 6y ago
Hearing Loss Treatment Report creator here. Thank you for referencing the site, I appreciate it.

by dasb 6y ago

vagrantJin 6y ago

I get it when my right ear has way too much earwax. J lose some hearing and the ringing wont stop. Just a bit annoying so Im usually wearing headphones with nice soothing music until I can get that wax out.

furyofantares 6y ago
Are you using cotton swaps in your ears? What might be happening is that you shove wax in, clogging your ears and giving you tinnitus. That used to happen to me - the ear wax wasn't the problem, trying to clean it was.
- modeless 6y ago
  To clean your ears yourself you need something like this: https://www.japantrendshop.com/coden-ear-scope-13000-standard-p-2756.html https://www.japantrendshop.com/coden-ear-scope-13000-standar... I thought it was ridiculous when I first saw it but I took a chance on it and it is actually a great product. You can clearly see everything and clean without damaging your ear. If you've ever had to go to the doctor to clear a blocked ear, you need one of these. With occasional use (~once/month) your ears will never be blocked again.
  - dmoy 6y ago
    Oh wow that is amazing I also get mild tinnitus for the last 6 or so years due to earwax (once it got completely blocked and I had to go to the doctor to have them irrigate it back out). I don't use cotton or any scraping right now, but I do use the same stuff the doctor used to irrigate it every once in awhile, to middling effect. Maybe I'll try out that ear scope thing.
    - jakear 6y ago
      I've had great success with the ~$20 ear pump devices available at your local drug store. They look like a normal squirt bottle with a tube tip, you fill it up with warm water and just keep squeezing. I'm not sure what the scope would do for me... I can hear the ear is clogged, I don't need a visual confirmation.
      - dmoy 6y ago
        Yea that's pretty similar to what I'm currently using.
      - modeless 6y ago
        I find that process uncomfortably loud, and I worry about damaging my ear with too much pressure. I also find it difficult to tell if it's working or if it's finished, especially if the ear is not plugged all the way yet, which I want to avoid. The endoscope is faster, easier, more comfortable, and makes it possible to clean when the ear is not actually plugged and verify that it worked.
      - Fezzik 6y ago
        I have been using these at least twice a month since high-school (20+ years) after having multiple dramatic ear infections that rendered me temporally unable to hear due to clogging. I was just at the ENT doc last week and he confirmed that my ears 1) look and function great and 2) there is no damage, at all, from using these mini turkey baster like devices when they are used correctly. I highly recommend them, but your own experience may differ and you should probably check with an ENT doc just to be sure.

tstubben 6y ago

I'm also following FX-322 and keeping my fingers crossed that the trials result in a real significant effective treatment for my SSHL in my right ear. It would really be amazing!

patorjk 6y ago

Carl LeBel (Chief Development Officer of Frequency) revealed on the Tinnitus Talk Podcast that several patients in the Phase I/II study reported "improved" tinnitus to their ENTs. How much improvement wasn't measured, but it's one of the reasons they're testing for tinnitus in the phase 2a study. Otonomy's OTO-413 drug (to fix the ribbon synapses in the cochlea) also seems really promising (results are due out next month). However, for their phase I/II study they're not testing for tinnitus and are actually excluding patients with "bothersome tinnitus". I'm hoping they see the same thing as Frequency and that some patients report improved tinnitus. These two drugs together (regrowing hair cells and ribbon synapses) seem like they could be a good one-two punch against hearing loss and tinnitus.

meowface 6y ago

>The researchers found that some body tissues regenerate much better than others. They studied the lining of the small intestine, which turns over roughly every four days, because it’s designed to absorb and distribute nutrients to other parts of the body. Drs. Karp and Langer saw the molecular pathways that signal the lining’s cells to turn over quickly and form new tissues. >Around the same time, another scientific group found very similar cells in the cochlea – but with one big difference: in the cochlea, these cells weren’t active. They saw that the cochlea’s cells didn’t regenerate and form new sensory hair cells. “So that was the formation of Frequency,” LeBel explains. “And Frequency was asking, why is that the case? Why is it that the cochlea isn’t regenerating cells and the small intestine is?” >This led to the discovery of two small molecules that make up FX-322, which targets these cells, called progenitor cells. Essentially, this process is meant to drive hair cell regeneration: The drug targets pathways to those cochlear cells, and when activated, they divide and form a new cell of themselves, called daughter cells. “And then most importantly, they form a new sensory hair cell,” LeBel says. That sounds incredible. If it really can reliably do what they claim with no significant negative side effects, that'd seem like one of the most "miraculous" treatments I've heard of in a while, both in terms of the technique and what it could accomplish.

lr4444lr 6y ago
Yep. Frequency Therapeutics could make a tremendous medical breakthrough here. But some caution is warranted, even in light of their promising human trials: cochlear cell regeneration and subsequent hearing restoration is observed in reptiles and birds, so there is reason to believe that they can coax mammalian ears to do the same thing, but it may not be as generalizable a result across the human body. But damn will people start trying mightily if it succeeds in the ears. That said, even simply finding a cure for sensorineural hearing loss is nothing short of perhaps one of the top 10 medical breakthroughs in the last 50 years if you look at the cost to society and prevalence of it.
- meowface 6y ago
  My baseless armchair speculative fear, with absolutely zero knowledge of this field or technology, is if some of the new hair cells could maybe somehow not fully "sync with" or complement the existing set and perhaps just make you hear "differently" but not necessarily better, and perhaps even worse in some contexts, depending on what % of your existing hair cells were healthy. I have no clue if that has any remote basis in reality, though. And perhaps your brain would eventually learn to sort it all out, so maybe any increased sensory sensitivity would generally be a net plus either way, once enough time passes.

pacomerh 6y ago

Thanks for the resources. I'm usually following https://www.tinnitustreatmentreport.com/ https://www.tinnitustreatmentreport.com/ for all things tinnitus and that's where I saw the FX-322

urgentresearch 6y ago
Tinnitus Treatment Report creator here. Glad you find the site useful and thank you for sharing the link. Appreciated.

urgentresearch 6y ago

Hearing Loss Treatment Report creator here. Thank you for referencing the site, I appreciate it.