Don't Let Dizziness Throw You Off Balance

AUDIOLOGY CAN PLAY A KEY ROLE IN MANAGING VERTIGO.

- Peter Marincovich

Although you may feel helpless when you’re hit with a dizzy spell, you can address balance problems in many ways. Diagnostic and treatment options have improved tremendously over the last decade, making dizziness a much easier problem to solve.

Dizziness, also called vertigo, is the second most common medical complaint. According to the National Institutes of Health, dizziness strikes 70 percent of Americans at some point in their lives—as many as 90 million people. These conditions are particularly prevalent in older Americans.

In addition to restricting people’s ability to move about freely, balance and dizziness disorders can deeply affect their psychosocial wellbeing; 50 percent of people who visit a doctor for dizziness have a psychological disorder, such as anxiety and depression, that’s either caused or exacerbated by their balance issue.

Dizziness can be fleeting or chronic. Acute attacks of dizziness, vertigo, or a general loss of balance may last a few seconds or a few hours. However, some may feel a chronic, persistent sense of imbalance, unsteadiness, or loss of sure-footedness. These conditions can make people feel disoriented, experience blurred vision and/or nausea, and cause a variety of other problems.

Although fairly common, these symptoms can be signs of an underlying condition, which if left untreated can impact quality of life and increase the risk of crippling falls.

Dizziness and Vertigo