Scottish woman could hear her EYES MOVE due to condition
- Philippa Thomson was diagnosed with superior canal dehiscence syndrome
- It was caused by a hole in her head that made her have hypersensitive hearing
- She claims was able to hear some of her body parts moving, including her neck
- Surgeons performed 10 operations to repair the hole and restore her hearing
Stephen Matthews For Mailonline
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A mother was able to hear her eyes moving and blood pumping around her body as a result of a bizarre condition.
Philippa Thomson, 59, from North Berwick, Scotland, suffered from superior canal dehiscence syndrome for more than 10 years.
She claims she was even able to hear some body parts moving, including her neck whenever she turned it – ‘like a horror movie’.
Her hypersensitivity was triggered by a hole in her head that was caused by pressure changes on board a flight in her 40s, experts discovered.
Surgeons performed 10 operations to repair the hole, allowing for the writer to finally stop hearing the sounds inside of her body.
However, she still suffers with barometric pressure changes, meaning she only feels well when it is sunny outside – as the cold weather causes her extreme headaches.
Philippa Thomson suffered from superior canal dehiscence syndrome for more than 10 years. It caused her to be able to hear her eyes move and her blood pump around her body
Ms Thomson said: ‘I wondered whether anyone else felt like this. I would never talk to people about it. I was embarrassed.
‘My eyes made a clocking sound for a long time. I didn’t know that other people didn’t have clicking in their eyes. It’s quite creepy when you are hearing things that others can’t.
‘My neck would also start creaking like a rickety boat in a horror movie. The noises were loud enough to disturb you.’
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She added: ‘It’s not something you expect but you do get accustomed to them. It was unusual but I didn’t go round asking people if their neck also creaked. It was a revelation to get the diagnosis.
‘Very disconcerting things were happening. It makes you feel like you’re going a bit bonkers.
‘Life became a constant battle to just live normally. It was like a form of torture sometimes.’
Surgeons performed 10 operations to repair the hole, allowing for the writer to finally stop hearing the sounds inside of her body (pictured after her final surgery in 2012)
However, she still suffers with barometric pressure changes that means she only feels well when it is sunny outside – as the cold weather causes her extreme headaches
The condition, caused when a hole develops between the inner ear and the brain, also caused her head to vibrate when she was exposed to loud external sounds.
She revealed how one time she went for a walk and heard a clanging noise – but was adamant that it was down to building works in the distance.
But she discovered that it was the keys in her pocket.
Initially, doctors discovered a hole in her head in 2007 after she went on a flight four years earlier.
This was repaired in 2008, leading doctors to believe they had cured the condition. But another hole was soon created, believed to be from a childhood bike accident.
She experienced headaches, fatigue, dizziness and the hypersensitivity often caused her eyes to unexpectedly close.
She said: ‘Life became a constant battle to just live normally. It was like a form of torture sometimes’ (pictured: her scars after surgery)
Ms Thomson added: ‘If I hadn’t had the condition I would have been more ambitious. It would have changed my life’
Surgeons conducted another operation to fix the hole in 2012 after she complained it was affecting her social life and affected her then marriage.
WHAT IS THIS CONDITION?
Superior canal dehiscence syndrome was first described in medical literature in 1998.
Patients diagnosed with the condition can suffer from vertigo, hypersensitivity to noises and oscillopsia – the sense that stationary objects are moving.
The condition is caused when a hole, or thinning of the bone, develops between the inner ear and the brain.
This bone should cover and protect the inner ear but with SCDS the inner ear is exposed to more vibrations.
This can develop from a trauma or slowly over time as a result of the pressure placed on the bone by a part of the brain called the temporal lobe.
The average age of diagnosis is 45 and it is believed that one to two per cent of the population have an abnormally thin bone covering the superior canal.
Some people with the condition control their symptoms by avoiding the situations that distress them.
However, for other patients, the symptoms are much more debilitating and usually require surgery to treat the problem.
Source: American Speech Language Hearing Association
Ms Thomson said: ‘I used to get very anxious in social situations. I told myself to get a grip because I was a confident and articulate person but it was a vicious cycle. I never really talked about it.
‘I was worried about going out of the house. There was no pattern to it, sometimes I would be fine and sometimes it would be terrible. I couldn’t make sense of it.
‘It would put a strain on my relationships. I was often cancelling plans and I couldn’t explain why. It has a knock-on effect to the people in your life.
‘If I hadn’t had the condition I would have been more ambitious. It would have changed my life.’
She has since recovered from her 10th operation, but still suffers with tinnitus and barometric pressure changes.
Ms Thomson added: ‘I’m still very affected by barometric pressure changes which will never go. I feel my best when it’s sunny. That’s when everything is functioning well.
‘When the pressure starts to drop with changeable weather, wind and rain, my head starts to feel like a lead weight, everything starts to close in and I get severe headaches.
‘I look out the window to check the weather and I do plan my day around it. I can tell from my head whether the pressure is high or low.
‘It does tend to be windy days with changeable weather that affect me, which you get a lot of in Scotland.’
But she said she is now ‘better than I have ever been’ and that she is making up for lost time.
She is working on setting up an official organisation to increase awareness and promote research towards the condition, and has even written a book called A Hole in My Life. Battling Chronic Dizziness.
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