Introduction Section
CBT4T-6 is provided for those with an on-boarding Tinnitus Functional Index (TFI) below 40% (mid-TFI category 3)
BEFORE YOU DECIDE TO JOIN CBT4T-6 MODULE PROGRAMME OR THE MAIN CBT4T PROGRAMME
Before you enrol, it is really important that you understand what CBT for Tinnitus is for. I use one Guiding Principle to explain:
The first thing to do is to complete your initial TFI (Tinnitus Functional Index). I seriously encourage you to complete your TFI questionnaire before you enrol on the course.
Tinnitus Functional Index
I ask you to complete your TFI before you enrol for two reasons:
Completing it gives you your starting point. It reflects how you have been coping with tinnitus over the past week to two weeks. It gives you a measure that is used to "measure" how much you progress and improve through using the course. You'll complete it again at the end of the 6 module programme, and having begun with an initial category 3 TFI, your score is expected to have reduced by at least one category
The second reason is that your TFI may be TOO HIGH for the CBT4T-6 Module programme to benefit you, and you should be enrolling on the main CBT4T programme
Once enrolled on the programme, I also ask that you complete and send in several additional measures, and also a brief history of what has happened in terms of your tinnitus to date - it is called your Mini-history.
As soon as you enrol, you have access to all the materials in Module 1.
The CBT4T programme is not the same as a "book about tinnitus". If you want a good, informative book about tinnitus, one of the best ones around is "Living with Tinnitus and Hyperacusis" by Laurence McKenna, David Baguley and Don McFerran.
The CBT4T programme is a hands on, practical, module-based course that enables you to REDUCE tinnitus distress.
One of the elements of 'tinnitus treatment' - historically known as tinnitus management - is "education", and the CBT4T programme walks you through that process.
Module 1 starts you on that process, and includes not only the basics of the mechanism of tinnitus, but even more importantly, why and how to begin making the necessary physiological changes. The practical element of CBT4T is THE most significant aspect of changing the experience of tinnitus from being distressing - with all that 'distress' entails - to reducing distress.
As well as the straightforward practical exercise(s) throughout the programme, I have included some of the neuroscience behind them. Neuroscience is basically "brain science" behind what's going on both in terms of neurochemistry (chemical changes in the brain) and neurobiological systems (the nervous systems in the body). I have included additional optional reading about this for those with a particular interest in it all.