ArticlePLOS digital health2023
Pilot study of a smartphone-based tinnitus therapy using structured counseling and sound therapy: A multiple-baseline design with ecological momentary assessment.
Article in PLOS digital health, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT06792461 (A Randomized Controlled Trial to Evaluate the Implementation of an eHealth Platform for Promoting Healthy Habits Among Adolescents From Socially Disadvantaged Settings), which is not on this map. Cited by 9 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
A Randomized Controlled Trial to Evaluate the Implementation of an eHealth Platform for Promoting Healthy Habits Among Adolescents From Socially Disadvantaged Settings: the ePro-Schools Project
Who cites it
9 citing papers in PubMed, 10 citations in OpenAlex.
- Increased prevalence of depressive symptoms and stress in patients with chronic bothersome tinnitus during the COVID-19 pandemic.European archives of oto-rhino-laryngology : official journal of the European Federation of Oto-Rhino-Laryngological Societies (EUFOS) : affiliated with the German Society for Oto-Rhino-Laryngology - Head and Neck Surgery · 2026Article
- Uncovering latent trajectories of daily tinnitus symptoms through app-based monitoring during treatment.Internet interventions · 2026Article
- Tinnitus.Nature reviews. Disease primers · 2026Review
- Digital Tinnitus Counseling in Clinical Practice: A Multicenter Randomized Controlled Trial.Audiology research · 2025Article
- Tinnitus Measured in Everyday Life: A Literature Review of Ecological Momentary Assessment Studies.Journal of the Association for Research in Otolaryngology : JARO · 2025Review
- Understanding tinnitus symptom dynamics and clinical improvement through intensive longitudinal data.NPJ digital medicine · 2025Article
- Research trends and hotspots of cognitive behavioral therapy for tinnitus: a bibliometric analysis.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2025Article
- Eye Movement Desensitization Protocol for Urge to Reduce Scratching Behaviour in Patients with Prurigo Nodularis: A Pilot Study.Acta dermato-venereologica · 2024Article
- The Effectiveness of a Smartphone Application for Tinnitus Relief.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
10 authors at 4 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Tinnitus affects a considerable part of the population and develops into a severe disorder in some sufferers. App-based interventions are able to provide low-threshold, cost-effective, and location-independent care for tinnitus patients. Therefore, we developed a smartphone app combining structured counseling with sound therapy and conducted a pilot study to evaluate treatment compliance and symptom improvement (trial registration: DRKS00030007). Outcome variables were Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) measured tinnitus distress and loudness and Tinnitus Handicap Inventory (THI) at baseline and final visit. A multiple-baseline design with a baseline phase (only EMA) followed by an intervention phase (EMA and intervention) was applied. 21 patients with chronic tinnitus (≥ 6 months) were included. Overall compliance differed between modules (EMA usage: 79% of days, structured counseling: 72%, sound therapy: 32%). The THI score improved from baseline to final visit indicating a large effect (Cohens d = 1.1). Tinnitus distress and loudness did not improve significantly from baseline phase to the end of intervention phase. However, 5 of 14 (36%) improved clinically meaningful in tinnitus distress (ΔDistress ≥ 10) and 13 of 18 (72%) in THI score (ΔTHI ≥ 7). The positive relationship between tinnitus distress and loudness weakened over the course of the study. A trend but no level effect for tinnitus distress could be demonstrated by a mixed effect model. The improvement in THI was strongly associated with the improvement scores in EMA of tinnitus distress (r = -0.75; 0.86). These results indicate that app-based structured counseling combined with sound therapy is feasible, has an impact on tinnitus symptoms and reduces distress for several patients. In addition, our data suggest that EMA could be used as a measurement tool to detect changes in tinnitus symptoms in clinical trials as has already been shown in other areas of mental health research.
Identifiers
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.