The Inner Ear and Tinnitus

This article assumes that you already know that tinnitus is a ringing in the ears or another type of unwanted ear noise, as there is no outside stimulus, and to gain a better understanding of tinnitus, would you like to have a better understanding about our sense of hearing how it works, what can go wrong to cause tinnitus and what can be done to get rid of the unwanted noise. This article focuses on the inner ear, while the two other articles which can be found under my author name, focus on the outer ear and middle ear. Let us now look at the inner ear.

Up to this point, we followed the sound waves, which are collected by the outer ear and channeled through the ear canal and come in contact with the eardrum. The eardrum then vibrates with energy, the sound and sends it to the middle ear via the icicles, these three small bones, the hammer, anvil and stirrup, which magnifies and focuses the sound, leveraging sound energy when the stirrup or let go of frames cochlea, which takes us the starting point of the inner ear.

Medium through which the sound has gone up to this point has been the air, which is much less dense than liquid, but in the inner ear sound energy encounters the much closer medium of fluid-filled cochlea. Overcome the larger inertia or resistance closer fluid medium in the inner ear is responsible for amplification of sound energy by the icicles of the middle ear. And here in the inner ear, the way that the sound continues its journey to the brain is changing dramatically.

Snail has been so named because its shape resembles a snail or spiral shell, as "snail" literally means. Snail functions for transducers or convert the mechanical vibrations into electrical nerve impulses that are sent to the brain to be processed into a healthy forms we recognize.

When we get into the cochlea, we find three fluid-filled tubes. Two of them, the vestibular canal and the tympanic canal transmit the increased pressure when let go of pushing against the oval window, cochlea. A third channel cochlear canal, where the organ of Corte is found. The organ of Corte detects pressure impulses and sends electrical impulses to the brain via the auditory nerve response. These three channels or channels fit into the curved cochlear shape. A thin membrane called the basilar membrane that separates the three channels.

The basilar membrane acts as a base for the sensory cells of hearing, hair cells, of which there are around 20,000. These hair cells respond to different frequencies of sound waves that are transmitted through the cochlea, creating small electrical impulses. Then the body Corte housed in cochlear duct and is located on the basilar membrane. It works like a microphone that sends electrical impulses along the auditory nerve to the brain, which interprets these impulses as the sounds we hear. For better understanding tinnitus, it's about all we really need to know about the snail and how it works.

If you have been to find this look to hear fascinating, and I want to dig deeper into the topic, I certainly understand. Wikipedia is a great resource to start out if you want to dig deeper. Wikipedia offers good information and more importantly, it gives a lot of references that will allow you to go as deep as you want. But right now, let us stay with our focus on tinnitus.

The way our inner ear enables us to hear is amazing enough by itself, but this incredible small part of the body is also command central for the body's balance mechanism. Some other functions in the body also contribute to balance, such as eyesight, and input from muscles, but the vestibular system in the inner ear is pivotal in maintaining balance.

Three main components constitute the vestibular system: the utricle, the saccade and the three semicircular canals. The utricle and saccade track head position. Thus, they help to keep your head in proper alignment with the body. The utricle and saccade are both sensitive to gravity and acceleration. Because of the way they are, utricle detects changes in horizontal motion, while the saccade detects changes in vertical motion as you ride in an elevator. Working together, these two tiny bodies to track head motion in all three dimensions, and keep the brain informed, and it helps us to keep our adjusted head and our body in balance.

Another wonderful is how these tiny bodies work. The utricle and saccade are filled with thick liquid calcium carbonate particles suspension. Inside them are also hair-like sensor cells. When the head is moved, the particles suspended in fluid, is also moved by gravity or acceleration and comes into contact with sensors which responds by sending signals to the brain for processing. The brain then determines whether the head alone is moving or if the whole body is in motion. Of course the brain can use input from the eyes and muscles to help make its assessment, but the inner ear do much most of the work to keep your head in line with the body and keep the whole body in balance.

Meanwhile, the three semicircular canals that perform essentially the same function. But instead of focusing primarily on the head position, they provide information on body movement in general. These three half-round tubes called, superior, posterior, and external. To take into account all three spatial dimensions, these channels are in perpendicular alignment with one another, so that any movement forward or backward, left or right, up or down, or a combination of motions can be treated properly. The semi-circular canals work in much the same way that the utricle and saccade work. The semi-circular canals are fluid-filled and has hair cells that are sensitive to gravity and acceleration, and react to movement by sending electrical impulses along nerve fibers to the brain.

Whether we are aware of it or not, the inner ear is constantly at work performing all these functions. To maintain our sense of balance, we rely on the vestibular system to collect motion information and send it on to the brain. The brain then processes the data, making the feeling of all the competing signals, and sends signals of its own to the muscles to keep us in balance.

When balance and tinnitus becomes problematic both together, it is often an indicator of Meier’s disease, which accounts for nearly one percent of all tinnitus cases. But far more common is a second tinnitus issues evolve in the inner ear, namely noise-induced damage to small hair receptor cells in the cochlea and noise damage or acoustic trauma accounts for 80-85% of all tinnitus cases. Apart freak, accidental exposure to everything loud sound, noise damage usually can be prevented by avoiding loud noises or using ear muffs or earplugs to protect our ears.