Yolande Kelly

 Let me extend my heartfelt congratulations to you on your latest publication which finally brings real hope to millions of people suffering from tinnitus. This is an unprecedented forward step in the therapeutic approach of this disease: a breakthrough that naturally follows the many years of research that you have devoted to this field, without ever deviating from your first intuition that the spindle-shaped cells of the cochlear dorsal nucleus "wrongly" code somatosensory influx when subjected to auditory deafferentation, thereby generating tinnitus. For fifteen years, the announcements are legion in terms of relief, and even healing tinnitus. But often, without saying all the time, these are animal studies that we assume that the transposition on man will be followed by the same beneficial effects. Since the techniques used are mostly heavy and invasive, the study phases on humans then face a lot of problems. The delays are long, and for the few studies that were almost completed, the results were generally very disappointing compared to what was expected. Today, the therapeutic offer (apart from the illusory theory of habituation and its derivatives) is practically non-existent: transcranial magnetic stimulation has finally little positive and quantified benefits, deep brain stimulation is not without risk and again is far from being a panacea, prospects related to vagus nerve stimulation also appear suffering from disappointments.  If we add to these the failed or extremely slow attempts regarding pharmacopoeia, it results in incredibly long delays between the treatment promised and its possible application (as long as it comes into being).  One only has to see the promising works dating from the early 2000s of Professor Remy Pujol from Inserm in Montpellier, that I'm lucky to know: a certain number of "poor choices", against which unfortunately he couldn't do anything, which conducted these works on cross roads (poor laboratory choice, poor NDMA antagonistic molecule choice ...) And this is just an example among others. As such, according to me, this is precisely where your discovery relegates all what is drawn from "antiquities" discovering: because it relies both on solid scientific data (where most often one was on a somewhat empirical approach, when it was not a matter of playing the sorcerer's apprentice for certain particularly invasive techniques), and because it already displays convincing results both on animals and on humans. For the first time in 24 years, that I am suffering from very disabling chronic bilateral tinnitus (I am now 43 years old), your publication has filled me with hope. Hope of relieving and certainly healing those unwanted, unbearable guests who have ravaged my life. Appearing as a result of sound trauma against which I had not been adequately warned about, and at a time when I was equally being treated on dental care after the (too long) wearing of an orthodontic appliance, my existence has completely swung into the inaccessible avoidance of these stray sounds. . Inaccessible... until I get to know your research a few years ago, and their current evolution with your January publication. Because since the beginning of its appearance, the first thing I noticed at the level of tinnitus is my ability to be able to modulate (very clearly) through neck movements, Jaw tightening, yawning ... even while walking, the ground impact of each step followed by a brief and synchronized peak of tinnitus intensity. All these somatosensory modulations only increase the perception of tinnitus, although there is no manoeuvre that helps to reduce it (it is not due to lack of sought). That's why I always thought, without obviously being able to explain it and demonstrate it as you brilliantly did, that there was a link between tinnitus and the somatosensory aspect. I have experienced moments when tinnitus perception is objectively less strong, and which seems correlated to a less excitability of my neuromuscular tone: which directed me over time to try relaxation, osteopathy, acupuncture, mesotherapy, wearing gutter, in order to reduce my "tensions" at rest. With more or less happiness, it is not easy to reduce my basal level. Reading your work, I could only see the concordance it has with my own "experience".  And for the first time, I can believe in a possible and next healing.  In times of great distress like the last few weeks, when tinnitus is so crippling that it prevents any work requiring a certain concentration, I dreamed ... yes I dreamed of tomorrow being happy again thanks to a person that I don't even know, but who already seems familiar. This dream is called Susan Shore.  Being a musician, you will understand that these tinnitus have been very difficult to accept, by the way they have never been accepted... So, at the cost of many sacrifices and necessary precautions, I succeeded to make my job my passion, which created great multimedia shows in France and around the world. But, instead of habituation, it is a growing exasperation that has settled, making tinnitus a more invasive host, with increasingly transitory moments of respite, almost non-existent now. That's why today I'm turning to you. On the one hand to propose to integrate your next study phase, even come to settle there (since it's located in France) the time it will take (I have the chance to have teams that can relay me, and who regularly do so because of my concentration and creation difficulties due to my tinnitus) On the other hand, to possibly benefit by then, from a test of your protocol, outside the "standardised" field of your study. Your teams having developed a certain number of devices, perhaps it would be conceivable to be able to resort to the provision of one of them over a few months, thus experiment with your laboratory a personalized test on a long period.  I have a scientific training in geophysics, which I think I have kept a certain rigor. As well as good knowledge on audiology devices (with an audiometer at home, etc.). I could therefore give you precise results of the evolution of your therapeutic protocol on my tinnitus, adjust / correct some parameters (like the latency between the auditory stimulus and the electric stimulus, the daily duration of the treatment...) with your teams , and perhaps, beyond my own experience, help to optimize your amazing discovery. I decided to discuss this last point with Professor Pujol, after he told me he knows you: this could if necessary be done in partnership (or not) with a "relay" laboratory in France, or with the ENT that follows me? In any case I would of course sign all the necessary documents, starting with that of complete confidentiality, etc, and I’m ready to pay for all that will be necessary for the progress of this protocol. I apologize for this little long email, and thank you in advance for the attention you will bring to my present application, which you will have understood in a well-considered context in order to make what I called above the dream "Susan Shore", become a reality filled with hope. While waiting to read from you, I assure you of my most respectful feelings.