Articles: vertigo.
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Benign paroxysmal positional vertigo, vestibular neuronitis and Menière's disease cause most cases of acute vertigo. However, doctors must consider central neurological reasons to vertigo. If it is determined that a patient has oto-neurological vertigo, the next task is to determine whether the patient has a peripheral or a central cause of vertigo, if the condition is potentially lethal and if there is a need for acute radiological imaging and/or medical intervention. This review highlights the oto-neurological approach to the dizzy patient with particular focus on the patient's history, clinical tests and treatment.
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To ascertain and characterize the point prevalence of dizziness or vertigo in migraineurs presenting for routine appointments at a specialty headache clinic. ⋯ Subjective complaints of dizziness or vertigo appear to be relatively common accompaniments of migraine, particularly migraine with aura, and prevalence increases with age. Disequilibrium symptoms have a strong and positive association with the severity of migraine pain. With co-occurrence higher than expected by chance, the relationship either reflects comorbidity or these symptoms may be part of the migraine presentation. With a point prevalence of 15.7%, and factors that link expression both to the intensity of migraine pain and to migraine aura, the authors believe that the true relationship may prove to be the latter.
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Case Reports
The nervous system: conditions involving the nervous system can present in many different ways.
Vertigo is a fairly common complaint encountered by medics. It is very upsetting and unpleasant for the patient, but it is usually benign and resolves on its own. However, it is vital that the medic be able to differentiate between common vertigo and a more serious condition like stroke. Careful attention to history and physical exam will allow medics to make the right determinations.
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Postural stability in humans is largely maintained by vestibular, visual, and somatosensory inputs to the central nervous system. Recent clinical advances in the assessment of otolith function (e.g., cervical and ocular vestibular evoked myogenic potentials [cVEMPs and oVEMPs], subjective visual vertical [SVV] during eccentric rotation) have enabled investigators to identify patients with unilateral otolith impairments. This research has suggested that patients with unilateral otolith impairments perform worse than normal healthy controls on measures of postural stability. It is not yet known if patients with unilateral impairments of the saccule and/or inferior vestibular nerve (i.e., unilaterally abnormal cVEMP) perform differently on measures of postural stability than patients with unilateral impairments of the horizontal SCC (semicircular canal) and/or superior vestibular nerve (i.e., unilateral caloric weakness). Further, it is not known what relationship exists, if any, between otolith system impairment and self-report dizziness handicap. ⋯ We interpret these findings as evidence that a significantly asymmetrical cVEMP in isolation negatively impacts performance on measures of postural control compared to normal subjects but not compared to patients with significant caloric weaknesses. However, patients with a unilaterally abnormal cVEMP do not differ from patients with significant caloric weaknesses in regard to self-perceived dizziness handicap.
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Dizziness is a common presenting complaint to the emergency department (ED), and emergency physicians (EPs) consider these presentations a priority for decision support. Assessing for nystagmus and defining its features are important steps for any acute dizziness decision algorithm. The authors sought to describe nystagmus documentation in routine ED care to determine if nystagmus assessments might be an important target in decision support efforts. ⋯ Nystagmus assessments are frequently documented in acute dizziness presentations, but details do not generally enable a meaningful inference. Recorded descriptions usually conflict with the diagnosis when a peripheral vestibular diagnosis is rendered. Nystagmus assessments might be an important target in developing decision support for dizziness presentations.