Around 65 million adults in the EU are affected by tinnitus and this figure is expected to rise over the next decade, new research involving Irish participants has found.

With tinnitus, a person experiences noises in one or both of their ears for which there is no external source. These noises can include ringing, buzzing and hissing. Currently, there is no cure or approved medicines to treat the condition, but there are therapies available to help manage it.

Researchers from the UK, Italy, Germany and Malaysia set out to determine a European-wide estimate for tinnitus frequency. They recruited over 11,000 people in 12 EU nations, including Ireland, Spain and Poland, to take part in a cross sectional European Tinnitus Survey.

The researchers found that the prevalence of any type of tinnitus was 14% and it was 1.2% higher in women than in men. This equates to around 65 million adults throughout the EU.

Just over 1% of the participants were found to have severe tinnitus and prevalence of the condition significantly increased with age and worsening of hearing.

“This is the first time that we’ve properly and rigorously measured the scale of how much of a problem tinnitus is across Europe as a whole. Tinnitus can affect people’s mental wellbeing and as the population grows, and people live for longer, this problem will only get worse,” commented one of the study’s authors, Prof Michael Akeroyd, of the University of Nottingham.

He added that he hoped these findings would be used “to implement effective treatments and to encourage the appropriate stakeholders across the EU to look at how they can tackle this growing problem”.

Details of these findings are published in the journal, The Lancet Regional Health – Europe.