If you experience constant ringing, buzzing or hissing in your ears, you're probably suffering from tinnitus, a condition that lowers the quality of life for millions of people.
If you're looking for ways to treat tinnitus, here's what you need to do.
Firstly, you need to get a clean bill of health from your doctor.
Tinnitus is difficult to treat because it has so many causes so the first thing to do is eliminate any physical roots.
Causes of tinnitus can include brain lesions, ear infections and rare ailments such as Meniere's disease.
These require medical treatment and your doctor is your best source of advice.
However most cases of tinnitus are not related to any underlying disease and can be treated by alternative methods.
These can work well to treat the symptoms and get rids of that interminable ringing or crackling and let your lead a normal life again.
The first thing to do is to check if something you're eating or taking is causing your tinnitus.
These can include medications such as aspirin, antibiotics, and quinine.
Other potential culprits include caffeine and alcohol.
Try and eliminate them one at a time from your diet and see if there's any improvement.
Another powerful option is to use one of the many alternative therapies such as herbal treatments, acupressure, aromatherapy and homeopathy.
Herbal treatments work both to promote overall health and balance and deal with the actual tinnitus.
Here are just two from nature's vast pharmacy.
Ginkgo biloba has been proven to work in certain cases of tinnitus.
It's free from all side effects and has other beneficial properties as well.
Sunflower seeds have a long history of use against tinnitus in China.
You can either munch them or brew them into a tea.
Acupressure can work to produce deep healing in the tissues in the head around the ears.
This can right imbalances that might be causing your tinnitus.
Aromatherapy promotes relaxation.
Tinnitus is often caused or made worse by stress or high blood pressure and relaxation can help in both cases.
Homeopathy is an established path to freedom from tinnitus.
It works in a gentle way both to remove the symptoms and treat the underlying cause.