Long-term changes in multimodal intensive tinnitus therapy: A 5‑year follow-up

Abstract

Background: We present 5‑year follow-up data for tinnitus-specific and comorbid depressive symptoms as well as stress-related outcome variables of an intensive multimodal 7‑day tinnitus therapy. Method: Tinnitus burden (Tinnitus Questionnaire), stress (Perceived Stress Questionnaire), and depressive symptomatology (General Depression Scale) were measured at the 5‑year follow-up after a multimodal intensive 7‑day intervention. In all, 94 patients participated in the study. Results: All outcome variables showed significant improvement at the end of the 7‑day intensive treatment. These effects remained significant after 5 years. Conclusion: The results of the present study support the effectiveness of the 7‑day multimodal intensive therapy for tinnitus. Posttreatment improvements were related to both tinnitus burden as well as stress and depressive symptoms and were maintained at the 5‑year follow-up.