From May 1984 through April 1985, 20 patients visited our clinic for the first time to seek help for tinnitus without concurrent vertigo. These patients had nystagmus tests with Frenzel's glasses and stepping tests in addition to audiometry. At the time of the first examination, 18 of these 20 patients displayeda nystagmus, 17 showed an angle of rotation of more than 30° in the stepping test, and only 1 demonstrated neither nystagmus nor deviation. These findings are interpreted as suggesting that many patients with severe tinnitus have a lesion not only of the cochlea but also of the vestibule and are in a condition similar to an attack of Meniere's disease.
For these patients with tinnitus, rest was prescribed as for those with an attack of Mdniere's disease, with oral steroids administered when tinnitus was especially severe. After 1 to 2 weeks of this regimen 17 of the 20 patients were entirely freed from or relived of tinnitus and no longer exhibited nystagmus and deviation. Four patients in this series had normal hearing and hence their condition was thought to correspond to 'tinnitus without hearing loss.'
