Who is Dr. Andrea La Torre?

"If Christopher Columbus, Copernicus and Galileo had trusted on what everyone was saying, we still would believe that the sun revolves around a flat Earth." (A. La Torre)

I'm an Italian doctor and researcher in the field of Inner ear disorders.

I was born in Rome 48 years ago. I lived and worked in Italy for most of my life. Recently I've decided to live in Riga, the capital of Latvia.
I became Doctor in Medicine 24 years ago, and since 1993 I'm a specialist in Otolaryngology.
I have dedicated the last 15 years of my professional activity to understand and treat tinnitus, sensorineural hearing loss, dizziness and subjective disturbance of balance, and Meniere's Syndrome, still considered by many colleagues, due to laziness, superficiality, lack of interest or prevailing commercial aims, "the dark side of otolaryngology".
I always looked further to develop more effective therapies for the treatment of endolymphatic and perilymphatic hydrops of the inner ear, the most common and most overlooked cause of these disorders, rejecting every cliché, but performing researches with scientific skepticism and pure application of logic.
What I can offer, as the result of years of scientific research on several thousand patients, and dozens of different diagnostic tests, often personally designed or modified for the purpose, involving also specialists from other disciplines, is an effective treatment to help many patients (but not everyone, because real permanent damages remain untreatable, although never provable in advance) even without further need for diagnostic tests, after they have been systematically carried out in over 16,000 cases until 2009.
In order to start the therapy, today, I do not need the tests any more because they are not useful for me to decide the approach with the single patient.
What we need instead, and what is usually neglected, is a correct assessment of the patient and not just of the ear. We need to care about the real impact on his/her life arising from the disorders and even take in account the actual psychological condition, that is critical, because the hydrops is a situation where stress plays a leading role.
Nowadays the relationship of the antidiuretic hormone (ADH) with the inner ear fluids and hydrops is well known. This hormone is the main target of my therapy against the hydrops.

Having overcome the need for specific tests, I can get closer to patients around the world without geographical limits, offering medical advice, consultation and assistance to the patients worldwide, thanks to the technology, using Video Skype Consultations on the Internet. A much more efficient, cost-effective way and without any need to move around. Fortunately this can be actually offered even because I can manage a video consultation in Italian, my native language, in English, in Spanish, in French, in Russian and... in Latvian (not so spread, indeed!).

I'm translating this website in as many languages as possible and any help will be appreciated.

You can contact me for any need through Skype or by mail or voice mail (contacts and links are available at the end of the page).

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You won't pay nothing, of course, just to request more information!

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• Information about
  Skype Video Consultation

  Skype (www.skype.com) is a free application that allows you to perform cost-free unlimited high quality video conferencing over the Internet with other Skype users.

  
  
  

  To use Skype you only need:
  1. A broad band internet connection
  2. Download the Skype application and register for free. It's all very easy.
  
  
  3. A webcam (they are very cheap if you have to buy one) and a sound system for speaking and listening.

  I've started offering Video Skype consultations already in July 2011, as an alternative to traditional counseling in a clinic, having definitively verified the lack of therapeutic alternatives to the therapy against the hydrops, the only treatable condition in the inner ear, even when the lack of fluctuating, variable symptoms, doesn't show the evident absence of permanent damages.
  
  In this way it is possible to offer my treatment and my full continuous assistance to patients that could never otherwise take advantage of it, due to obvious geographical limits.

  I can offer consultation in these languages:
  For other languages you need an interpreter

• Request for a consultation
  Booking form

  Patients living in Italy or Italian citizens, even if living abroad, have to check www.idrope.com/info.html and MUST use only that page to book a consultation.

• Use only Latin letters.
  
  *Last name, First name
  
  
  *Age *Male *Female
  
  *Your e-mail address
  
  
  *Your nationality / citizenship
  
  *Where do you live (Country) ?
  
  
  *Language for the consultation
  Italiano English Français
  Castellano Latviešu Русский
  
  *Preferred date and times (your time, include your time zone):
  
  
  *Your skype username:
  
  
  

  
  

  Do you find this page useful?
  I'm planning to translate the full italian site in English and in as many language as possible, to promote the knowledge about the inner ear hydrops and his treatment. But I can't do it alone, because I ask to the foreign patients only a small fee for the consultation and the treatment on the basis of their different possibilities, living in different countries and I can't pay professional translators and the promotion of the website all by myself. If you think this is worth you can give your contribution to this project with a small donation (only 1 euro).
  
  

  

Did you know...?

• 1

  It's always the inner ear...

  From the anatomical point of view, the ear can be subdivided into three parts, the outer ear, the middle ear and the inner ear. All three sectors are involved in auditory function, but only the inner ear (cochlea) or the acoustic nerve that connects the ear to the brain can cause sensorineural hearing loss or tinnitus. And only in the inner ear (labyrinth) there are vestibular receptors able to cause spinning vertigo, dizziness or subjective balance disorders. Forgetting the basis of anatomy, most of the specialists analyse the entire body (central nervous system, temporomandibular joint, cervical spine and moreover), looking for impossible sites of origin of tinnitus or vertigo, but no patients with these symptoms have in effect a perfect inner ear if studied with the proper tests. And this is the main reason why after years of research confirming the role of the inner ear in every single patient, I don't need to test each patient anymore.

• 2

  Cells, nerves and... fluids

  Let's look inside the inner ear. What do we have in the inner ear? Only cells (hair cells in the cochlea and cells of the vestibular receptors in the vestibular part of the inner ear), nerve fibers (auditory nerve and vestibular nerve), and fluids (perilymph and endolymph). But knowing the biology of the inner ear cells (that are modified neurons) and nerves, we can be sure that a damage of cells or nerves would be always permanent and untreatable. Neurons and cochlear cells can not regenerate after a damage and they can not be repaired. Therefore, we can be sure that recurrent or fluctuating symptoms can NEVER arise from a cellular or neural damage, but only from a dysfunction created by the fluids (hydrops). This is the case of recurrent vertigo, fluctuating tinnitus or fluctuating hearing loss. But a persistent hydrops can be even the underlying cause of a non fluctuating tinnitus or cause a permanent (but reversible with the proper treatment) sensorineural hearing loss.

• 3

  Inner ear and Hydrops

  "Inner ear hydrops" means a condition of increased fluid volume in the inner ear. This is a well-known pathologic situation proven and studied for many years, although the primary causes leading the development of the hydrops remain unclear. This increased pressure can affect cochlear cells and vestibular receptors, thus creating different combinations of hearing loss, tinnitus, vertigo, balance disorders, subjective fullness. This condition is much more frequent than what is believed and it's underestimated, thinking about it only when every symptom is shown (in a typical Meniere's Disease). The increased inner ear fluid can lead to single symptoms (e.g. only tinnitus without hearing loss or vertigo), different combinations of different symptoms, or even remain asymptomatic. And any way the hydrops is the only treatable condition, considering that cellular damage could never be repaired.

• 4

  Hydrops and ADH

  The exact mechanisms regulating the amount of liquid necessary for the performance of cochlear function (hearing) and vestibular function (balance) are not yet fully understood, but what we know is enough to be able to propose a treatment against the misregulation of the inner ear fluids (hydrops). We know that an important role is played by the interaction between the antidiuretic hormone (ADH, also known as vasopressin) and specific hormonal receptors and specific water channels (aquaporins) have been identified in the inner ear almost 15 years ago. The release of the stimulating hormone, mainly activated by any kind of stress (not just psychological) and the lack of free water, and its interaction with the inner ear are the main target of my treatment. Here is a list of scientific articles about ADH (vasopressin), Meniere's Disease and Hydrops.

• 5

  The therapy

  My treatment against hydrops, the only one that I propose with few variants to every patient affected by tinnitus, dizziness, vertigo, subjective lack of balance, ear fullness, sensorineural hearing loss or a full Meniere's Disease, comes from the synergistic association of different pharmacological and non pharmacological components. The therapy is frequently updated. I have treated, since 1998, several thousand patients. The treatment lasts generally 3-4 months. It can't cure the patient in a definitive way, because relapses are in any case possible, but they can easily be treated at the moment of the recurrence without the need for a life-lasting treatment.
  The treatment is effective only against hydrops. Nothing can be done, of course, to restore real (but never proved in advance) permanent damages, that remain untreatable.
  There are no side effects and treatment is easy to perform for everybody, not requiring a real medical assistance, but few contraindications to some of the components must be previously excluded.
  In a first initial period the treatment includes only an overload of water and special drugs active on neurotransmitters to create a barrier between the stress and the release of ADH.
  Often this phase is already enough to improve the situation in an evident way, allowing to avoid further treatments. In case of failure or partial success of this easy first phase there will be the need to add other components, a special diet for 10-15 days, a therapy with steroids, able to act on the interaction between the inner ear and the ADH, a local treatment with self-inflated air using a simple device (Otovent). This second level-therapy is anyway repeated for 10 days each month for 3 months, even in case of early success to prevent short term recurrences.
  Further levels of treatment are sometimes needed.

• Explore the Blog to read much more!
  (idrope.wordpress.com)

  (Automatic translation)