Health blog Category: vestibular
Dizziness vs. Vertigo
Have you ever gotten out of bed too quickly and felt funny in your head? Have you ever rolled over in bed in the middle of the night and woke up with the room spinning? What exactly is the difference between these two sensations?
Dizziness vs. Vertigo
Dizziness is a catch all term describing multiple things. Dizziness can be lightheadedness, unsteadiness while walking, and/or vertigo. Vertigo itself is the sensation of the room spinning or even you spinning.
Why Do We Experience Dizziness?
Read full blogIs The Room Spinning?
Have you ever had the sensation that the room was spinning and you didn’t just come off of a rollercoaster? That sensation is called vertigo. Vertigo can be classified as the room spinning or if you feel like you are spinning.
Why does this happen?
There are several causes of vertigo some of which are related to issues of the brain and others that have to do with your inner ear. Your brain is the hierarchy of balance and your brain is connected to your inner ear via a nerve. When something goes wrong with parts of the brain or inner ear it can cause lightheadedness, balance issues, and nausea in addition to vertigo.
How can you tell if the symptom of vertigo is a serious issue?
Ask yourself the following questions:
- Does vertigo occur when you change the position of your head and/or body?
Balance Issues Occur in Both Older and Younger Populations
Balance issues occur in anyone, regardless of age. However, the cause of balance issues and how to treat them differ in older and younger populations.
We all have three systems that all work together to ensure we have good balance.
- We have our balance organ, which is our vestibular system in the inner ear.
- We have our leg strength.
- We also have our visual component which we rely heavily on when something else is not working properly.
My Experience with BPPV – Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo
As a physical therapist with over 20 years of experience I have pretty much seen or treated it all; but being the patient was a very different story.
Last March, I ended up with firsthand knowledge of what it feels like to suffer from vertigo; specifically BPPV. It was a Thursday in early March when I awoke with symptoms. When they say ‘benign’ they do mean benign because this came out of nowhere! I remember feeling “dizzy” or “off balance” in my sleep, though it didn’t fully wake me up.
Overview of the Vestibular System
Jan 29th 2015Overview of the Vestibular System
The vestibular system is our balance organ and lies deep within the inner ear near the temporal bone of our skull. Its main components are three semicircular canals (posterior, anterior, horizontal), the cochlea, utricle, and saccule. The semicircular canals are responsible for sensing the direction and amplitude of head rotation. The cochlea is our hearing organ. The utricle senses motion in the horizontal plane, and the saccule senses motion in the vertical plane.