Outpatient Tinnitus Clinic, Self-Help Web Platform, or Mobile Application to Recruit Tinnitus Study Samples?

Abstract

For understanding the heterogeneity of tinnitus, large samples are required. However, investigations on how samples recruited by different methods differ from each other are lacking. In the present study, three large samples each recruited by different means were compared: N = 5017 individuals registered at a self-help web platform for tinnitus (crowdsourcing platform Tinnitus Talk), N = 867 users of a smart mobile application for tinnitus (crowdsensing platform TrackYourTinnitus), and N = 3786 patients contacting an outpatient tinnitus clinic (Tinnitus Center of the University Hospital Regensburg). The three samples were compared regarding age, gender, and duration of tinnitus (month or years perceiving tinnitus; subjective report) using chi-squared tests. The three samples significantly differed from each other in age, gender and tinnitus duration (p < 0.05). Users of the TrackYourTinnitus crowdsensing platform were younger, users of the Tinnitus Talk crowdsourcing platform had more often female gender, and users of both newer technologies (crowdsourcing and crowdsensing) had more frequently acute/subacute tinnitus (<3 months and 4–6 months) as well as a very long tinnitus duration (>20 years). The implications of these findings for clinical research are that newer technologies such as crowdsourcing and crowdsensing platforms offer the possibility to reach individuals hard to get in contact with at an outpatient tinnitus clinic. Depending on the aims and the inclusion/exclusion criteria of a given study, different recruiting strategies (clinic and/or newer technologies) offer different advantages and disadvantages. In general, the representativeness of study results might be increased when tinnitus study samples are recruited in the clinic as well as via crowdsourcing and crowdsensing.

Prospective crowdsensing versus retrospective ratings of tinnitus variability and tinnitus–stress associations based on the TrackYourTinnitus mobile platform

“…In the aforementioned studies, prospective and retrospective assessments were juxtaposed manually. To effectively exploit the prospective assessments in a clinical setting, however, an integrated solution is needed, i.e., the EMA of a patient should be transferred automatically to a database and be made available to the responsible clinician(s) [34,43], given the consent of the patient. Note that it has been already reported for a long time that electronic systems are appreciated by study participants [17], increase data accuracy [29], lead to more complete datasets [22] and reduce costs [30] compared to traditional paper-based methods.…”

Does Tinnitus Depend on Time-of-Day? An Ecological Momentary Assessment Study with the “TrackYourTinnitus” Application

“…Taking time-of-day into account in the study design might be necessary in clinical studies. Yet, the results of our study rely solely on TYT users (who are not representative for clinical tinnitus patients, see Probst et al, 2017 ) and on one-item questions on tinnitus distress and tinnitus loudness making it difficult to conclude whether the observed differences between night/early morning and the upcoming day are clinically relevant. Future studies using assessment instruments appropriate to distinguish between clinically relevant and clinically irrelevant change (for example the Tinnitus Handicap Inventory (THI), see Zeman et al, 2011 ) with clinical tinnitus samples are necessary to address this point.…”

Smartphone Apps in the Context of Tinnitus: Systematic Review

“…For instance, the data collected from the TrackYourTinnitus app can be used to establish a connection between tinnitus and daily routine or activities [58]. Additionally, the same data can be analyzed to shape recruiting strategies for larger tinnitus-related studies [59], and to better understand tinnitus variability and tinnitus-stress associations [60]. Similarly, the similarities and differences in ecological momentary assessment data, collected from the TrackYourTinnitus app after a long time can also help physicians to understand the evolution of tinnitus patients [61].…”