Learning about Tinnitus from an Animal Model

ABSTRACT

Several animal models of tinnitus have been developed in the past 20 years. The premise on which these models are based is that chronic tinnitus is most likely a primitive hearing disorder. Because no evidence indicates that higher-order cognitive skills are required to experience tinnitus, it is also likely that animals such as laboratory rats can experience tinnitus. Chronic tinnitus in humans commonly emerges after peripheral auditory damage caused by exposure to loud sound, ototoxic agents, or aging. Tinnitus can be induced in animals using the same treatments. A significant advantage of using animals to study tinnitus is that the etiology of their disorder can be carefully controlled in a laboratory setting, a difficult task in human clinical studies. Although animals cannot describe their tinnitus verbally, their perception of sound, both objective and subjective, can be measured using psychophysical procedures. Furthermore, sensory processing and brain function can be determined with great detail in animals using a variety of measures. Over the past decade we have used our animal model of tinnitus to examine many fundamental aspects of tinnitus, including its sensory features, the time course of development, interactions with aging, neurophysiological correlates from cochlea to brain, and pharmacological treatment.

KEYWORDS

Animal model - chronic tinnitus - tinnitus pathology - tinnitus treatment

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