Tinnitus treatment device and method using bone conduction

Abstract

The present invention relates to a tinnitus treatment device and method by which various frequencies and volumes are sequentially output so that a user determines whether the frequencies and volumes match a tinnitus frequency and volume, selects a treatment mode, and performs tinnitus treatment. According to the present invention, when tinnitus occurs, the user can accurately select a tinnitus frequency and volume by comparing the tinnitus with sequential output sounds outputted at regular time intervals, tinnitus treatment suitable for the user is possible through mode selection, and since tinnitus treatment is performed through bone conduction output, tinnitus treatment can be continued for a long time without interfering with daily life.

Description

Bone conduction tinnitus treatment device and method

[0001] The present invention relates to a bone conduction tinnitus treatment device, which allows a user to directly control the frequency and volume, thereby enabling tinnitus treatment tailored to the symptoms of a tinnitus patient.

[0002] Tinnitus is a type of hearing disorder that causes distress due to the persistent perception of noise, even when there is no external source. There are various causes of tinnitus, including nervous system disorders, stress or fatigue, noise, and otitis externa. In Korea, approximately 15% of the population experiences tinnitus, with approximately 8% experiencing severe tinnitus that severely disrupts sleep, and approximately 1% experiencing severe disruption to daily life. Tinnitus can be broadly categorized as objective tinnitus and subjective tinnitus. Objective tinnitus refers to the actual perception of sounds generated within the body. Objective tinnitus can be caused by factors such as blood flow turbulence or muscle contraction, and the examiner can also hear the patient's tinnitus directly or indirectly.

[0003] The most common method for treating tinnitus is "sound therapy," which is known to be the most effective. This sound therapy uses external noise to mask the tinnitus, thereby modifying patients' perceptions and responses to it. Sound therapy can be divided into complete masking, where the entire tinnitus sound is masked with a stimulus sound, and partial masking, where the stimulus sound partially covers the tinnitus. The primary method for treating tinnitus involves listening to a separate stimulus sound to diminish the perception of tinnitus. This method typically requires 6-8 hours of daily exposure, making its use in everyday life inevitable. In daily life, various variables exist, such as the possibility of strong ambient noise and the potential for tinnitus relief. However, existing sound therapy methods have failed to provide users with a suitable treatment method that accommodates these variables, raising concerns that it could have a negative impact on hearing.

[0004] Korean Patent No. 10-2238446 proposes a tinnitus treatment device including: a reference setting unit that sets a treatment frequency reference from a tinnitus frequency of a subject and a treatment sound pressure reference from the tinnitus sound pressure of the subject based on tinnitus treatment type information; a treatment sound selection unit that selects a tinnitus treatment sound that satisfies the treatment frequency reference and the treatment sound pressure reference from among a plurality of tinnitus treatment sounds as an output tinnitus treatment sound; a treatment sound correction unit that corrects a tinnitus treatment sound that does not satisfy the treatment frequency reference and the treatment sound pressure reference from among a plurality of tinnitus treatment sounds so that it satisfies the treatment frequency reference and the treatment sound pressure reference; and an output unit that outputs a digital signal or an analog signal corresponding to the output tinnitus treatment sound; however, there is a problem in that an effective method for setting a user's treatment frequency reference and the treatment sound pressure reference is not presented.

[0005] The purpose of the present invention is to solve such problems, and the present invention provides a tinnitus treatment device and tinnitus treatment method that sequentially outputs various frequencies and volumes, allows a user to determine whether the frequencies and volumes match tinnitus, and select a treatment mode to perform tinnitus treatment.

[0006] The purpose of the present invention is to solve such problems, and the present invention provides a tinnitus treatment device including a signal generation unit that sequentially generates signals according to various frequencies and volumes, a bone conduction output unit that outputs the signals generated from the signal generation unit as bone conduction signals, a selection unit that determines whether the sequentially generated signals match tinnitus and allows a user to select a frequency and volume, and a control unit that generates and outputs a tinnitus treatment frequency and volume according to a mode selected by the user.

[0007] In addition, the present invention provides a tinnitus treatment method including a step of outputting sound in the order of low frequency to high frequency or high frequency to low frequency; a step of selecting a frequency when a user hears a frequency matching tinnitus; a step of outputting a volume of the frequency in the order of low volume to high volume or high volume to low volume; a step of selecting a volume when a user hears a volume matching tinnitus; a step of selecting a tinnitus treatment mode by the user, and a step of performing tinnitus treatment.

[0008] The present invention compares sequential output sounds output at regular time intervals when tinnitus occurs with tinnitus to accurately select the tinnitus frequency and volume, and tinnitus treatment tailored to the user is possible through mode selection.

[0009] In addition, since tinnitus treatment is performed through bone conduction output using the present invention, tinnitus treatment is possible without interfering with daily life.

[0010] Figure 1 is a flowchart showing the overall execution method of the tinnitus treatment method according to the present invention.

[0011] In order to fully understand the present invention, its operational advantages, and the objects achieved by the practice of the present invention, reference should be made to the accompanying drawings and the contents described in the drawings, which illustrate preferred embodiments of the present invention.

[0012] The expressions “includes,” “consists of,” “has,” etc., which may be used hereinafter, should be understood to not exclude additional components or functions.

[0013] Expressions such as “first…”, “second…”, “first”, “second”, etc., which may be used hereinafter, should not be construed as limiting the order or importance of components, unless explicitly stated otherwise.

[0014] The term "~unit" that may be used hereinafter includes a unit realized by hardware, a unit realized by software, and a unit realized using both. In addition, one unit may be realized by using two or more pieces of hardware, and two or more units may be realized by one piece of hardware. Meanwhile, the "~unit" is not limited to software or hardware, and the "~unit" may be configured to be in an addressable storage medium or may be configured to reproduce one or more processors. Accordingly, as an example, the "~unit" includes components such as software components, object-oriented software components, class components, and task components, as well as processes, functions, attributes, procedures, subroutines, segments of program code, drivers, firmware, microcode, circuits, data, databases, data structures, tables, arrays, and variables. The functionality provided within the components and "~units" may be combined into a smaller number of components and "~units" or further separated into additional components and "~units." Additionally, components and '~parts' may be implemented to regenerate one or more CPUs within a device or secure multimedia card.

[0015] In the use of terms below, singular expressions should be understood as not excluding plural expressions unless explicitly stated otherwise.

[0016] Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail by describing preferred embodiments thereof with reference to the attached drawings. The same reference numerals in each drawing represent the same components.

[0017] The purpose of the present invention is to solve such problems, and the present invention provides a tinnitus treatment device including a signal generation unit that sequentially generates signals according to various frequencies and volumes, a bone conduction output unit that outputs the signals generated from the signal generation unit as bone conduction signals, a selection unit that determines whether the sequentially generated signals match tinnitus and allows a user to select a frequency and volume, and a control unit that generates and outputs a tinnitus treatment frequency and volume according to a mode selected by the user.

[0018] The signal generation unit may be provided to output a frequency from a low frequency to a high frequency or vice versa at regular time intervals, so that when an output sound corresponding to a frequency band matching tinnitus is generated through the bone conduction output unit, the user may select the output sound through a selection unit, in the same manner as tuning a musical instrument. The selection unit may be implemented in various ways, such as a display touch screen or a separately provided button. According to the same principle, when tinnitus occurs, the sound of the selected frequency band may be output from a low volume to a high volume or vice versa at regular time intervals, so that the user may search for the frequency and volume at which tinnitus occurs by selecting the sound through the selection unit. The signal generation unit and the selection unit may be implemented by adding them to the user's terminal in the form of software and using a signal generation device and a display device and a communication unit built into the terminal. In this case, the communication unit 110 may include, for example, a cellular module, a WiFi module, a Bluetooth module, a GPS module (e.g., a GPS module, a Glonass module, a Beidou module, or a Galileo module), an NFC module, and an RF (radio frequency) module.

[0019] The control unit may include all types of devices capable of processing data, such as a processor. Here, the term 'processor' may refer to a data processing device built into hardware that has a physically structured circuit to perform a function expressed by a code or instruction included in a program, for example. Examples of such data processing devices built into hardware include processing devices such as a microprocessor, a central processing unit (CPU), a processor core, a multiprocessor, an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC), and a field-programmable gate array (FPGA), but the scope of the present invention is not limited thereto.

[0020] In addition, the present invention provides a tinnitus treatment method including a step of outputting sound in the order of low frequency to high frequency or high frequency to low frequency; a step of selecting a frequency when a user hears a frequency matching tinnitus; a step of outputting a volume of the frequency in the order of low volume to high volume or high volume to low volume; a step of selecting a volume when a user hears a volume matching tinnitus; a step of selecting a tinnitus treatment mode by the user, and a step of performing tinnitus treatment.

[0021] Sound therapy for tinnitus can be broadly divided into two types. The first method involves listening to a stimulus sound with a frequency similar to that of the tinnitus. Sound sources with a frequency range similar to that of the tinnitus can be used to dull the tinnitus over time, while still allowing the tinnitus to be heard, or to reduce the stress caused by it. The second method uses white noise (sound with equal energy across all frequencies) or music, but with the tinnitus frequency (e.g., 4 kHz) filtered out. While this method does not mask the tinnitus itself, it does not provide immediate relief from tinnitus. However, by consistently stimulating frequency bands other than the tinnitus frequency, it can divert the subject's attention away from the tinnitus frequency, ultimately causing the tinnitus itself to disappear or diminish over time. Accordingly, the tinnitus treatment mode includes a mode for performing tinnitus treatment in multiple frequency bands excluding a frequency band selected by the user, a mode for performing tinnitus treatment in a frequency band matching the tinnitus frequency band, and a mode for performing tinnitus treatment in multiple frequency bands including the tinnitus frequency band. The treatment mode can be selected according to the user's situation, and can be used to perform a specific mode for a specific period of time by changing the mode.

Claims

1. A tinnitus treatment device comprising a signal generation unit that sequentially generates signals according to various frequencies and volumes, a bone conduction output unit that outputs the signals generated from the signal generation unit as bone conduction signals, a selection unit that determines whether the sequentially generated signals match tinnitus and allows the user to select the frequency and volume, and a control unit that generates and outputs a tinnitus treatment frequency and volume according to the mode selected by the user.

2. A tinnitus treatment method characterized in that it additionally includes an ambient noise shielding unit according to claim 1.

3. A tinnitus treatment method comprising: a step of outputting sound in the order of low frequency to high frequency or high frequency to low frequency; a step of selecting a frequency when a user hears a frequency matching tinnitus; a step of outputting the volume of the frequency in the order of low volume to high volume or high volume to low volume; a step of selecting a volume when a user hears a volume matching tinnitus; a step of selecting a tinnitus treatment mode by the user, and a step of performing tinnitus treatment.

4. In the third paragraph, the step of selecting a tinnitus treatment mode by the user includes a mode for performing tinnitus treatment in multiple frequency bands excluding the frequency band selected by the user, a mode for performing tinnitus treatment in a frequency band matching the tinnitus frequency band, and a mode for performing tinnitus treatment in multiple frequency bands including the tinnitus frequency band.

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