Autophony

Autophony
Classification and external resources
ICD-9	388.40

Autophony is the unusually loud hearing of a person's own voice, breathing or other self-generated sounds.

Possible causes:

• The "Occlusion effect", caused by an object, such as an unvented hearing aid or a plug of ear wax, blocking the ear canal and reflecting sound vibration back towards the eardrum.

• Serous Otitis media

• Open or Patulous Eustachian tube, allowing vocal and/or breathing sounds to be conducted into the middle ear.

• Superior canal dehiscence, which can lead to an abnormally amplified bone conduction of sound into the inner ear. Persons with superior canal dehiscence syndrome (SCDS) typically hear not only their own voice but also heartbeat, footsteps, chewing, intestinal sounds and possibly even the sound of their eye movements when reading.

External links

• Autophony and the patulous eustachian tube
• Definition of Autophony
• Painhealth.com - Definition of Autophony
• emedicine Patulous Eustachian Tube
• SCDS with Autophony
• SCDS with Autophony - animation
• "Doctor, I can hear my eyes" - W Albuquerque, A M Bronstein
• ABC News - Health - Musician Who Heard Too Much