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Woman shares her health story living with rare condition, pulsatile tinnitus

MRI scan of a brain.
Bk87
/
Shutterstock
MRI scan of a brain.

For an estimated 5 million Americans, every beat of their heart can be heard in their ears as a constant "whooshing" sound making it difficult to sleep or concentrate and contributing to anxiety and depression. The condition is known as pulsatile tinnitus or P-T.

Those who treat people with P-T say the condition can go undiagnosed or misdiagnosed due to its rarity and the difficulty in determining the underlying cause.

On Wednesday’s “Sound of Ideas” we will meet a local woman who developed the condition and the doctor who used a surgical procedure to help reduce most, but not all of the noise she was hearing.

Also on the show, up first, we talk about the current labor dispute at a locally owned coffee chain and the recent closure of a café in Lakewood. Why are coffee shops currently flashpoints in the larger discussion regarding worker’s and unionization?

Finally, the Tennis in the Land tournament returns this weekend to the Flats. The tournament is now in its fifth year and brings to Cleveland some of the up and coming stars of the professional women’s tennis tour. We’ll talk to the tournament director about this year’s event and plans.

Guests:
- Abbey Marshall, Reporter, Ideastream Public Media
- Christopher Hayes, Ph.D., Assistant Teaching Professor, Labor Studies and Employment Relations, Rutgers University
- Lisa Jilbert, Patient
- Scott Raymond, M.D., Neuroradiologist, Cleveland Clinic
- Kyle Ross, Tournament Director, Tennis in the Land

Leigh Barr is a coordinating producer for the "Sound of Ideas" and the "Sound of Ideas Reporters Roundtable."