Tinnitus and its Relation to Nerve Deafness with an Application to the Masking Effect of Pure Tones

Sensitivity curves for ears afflicted with tinnitus.---Patients suffering from tinnitus, or ringing in the ear, show a marked decrease in sensitivity for the range of frequencies of the subjective tones, and for this range there is a decided masking effect.Masking effect for pure tones.---Tinnitus is associated with nerve lesions. These results, therefore, and also simple experiments with tuning forks, indicate that the conclusions of Wegel and Lane on the masking of objective tones may not be correct, and that the disturbance is in the nerve system and not in the mechanical system of the inner ear.