The main diagnostic test is called the Dix-Hallpike test. Your doctor will also examine your ears and eyes, check your balance and your nerves. No blood test is needed to diagnose BPPV, but your doctor may order some blood tests or further tests to rule out other conditions. They will also find out whether you have other symptoms such as hearing loss or ear fullness to rule out another diagnosis. Your doctor will ask you about your symptoms and their relation to any head movements. You are also at higher risk of BPPV if you are a woman, suffer from a head or ear injury, or have had an infection in your inner ear. It is not clear why some people have these loose calcium crystals, but it is thought to be related to increasing age, so BPPV is more common in people over the age of 40. Your brain gets confused between these extra nerve signals and the normal nerve signals sent from your unaffected ear, resulting in vertigo. These nerve signals tell your brain the movement and position of your head.īPPV occurs when there are loose calcium crystals in the fluid of the semicircular canals of one ear, causing extra nerve signals or wrong signals to be sent to your brain. Your semicircular canals contain fluids that send signals to your brain when your head moves. Image credit: Mike.lifeguard Wikimedia Commons The diagram (below) shows an example of the structure of your ear. The cochlea helps with hearing, whereas the semicircular canals help with balancing and posture. Your inner ear includes the cochlea and semicircular canals. BPPV is a condition that affects your inner ear. This is the only objective measure to ensure the BPPV has resolvedĭr John M Epley was my mentor and I hope this video will help shine a light on the signficance of his work and inspire you to encourage friends, family members, or patients experiencing random, recurrent, and abrupt episodes of vertigo, to seek diagnosis and treatment.Each of your ears has 3 parts: the outer ear, the middle ear and the inner ear. Follow-up the patient ONE-week post-treatment and repeat the diagnostic tests.The treatment of the semicircular canal(s) using a CRM in the plane of the canal.Most often it is one ear and one semicircular canal The ear and semicircular canal(s) affected.The vertigo is caused by BPPV because there are central pathologies which mimic peripheral BPPV and upper cervical problems which cause dizziness/light headedness.The Dix-Hallpike and Supine Roll manoeuvres are the international gold standard diagnostic tests for BPPV using infra-red video Frenzel goggles to prevent visual fixation. BPPV is all too often neither diagnosed nor managed correctly. The Epley Manoeuvre as BPPV treatmentĪlthough, BPPV is benign, the consequences of this disorder are NOT!īPPV is a major cause of falls in the older population, often resulting in life-threatening injuries, loss of independence, fear of falling and social isolation. It captures Dr John Epley explaining how he developed the Particle Theory and the Canalilthiasis Repositioning Manoeuvre (CRM) to treat BPPV that replaced the Habituation Theory on which the Brandt Daroff exercises were predicated. The video you are about to view is rare, and has surfaced on the Dr John M Epley profile page on the site, Life In The Fast Lane. He proposed the Particle theory and the treatment of BPPV, namely the Epley Manoeuvre (Canalilthiasis Re-positioning Manoeuvre) which repositions the particles (otoconia) in the semicircular canal into the utricle using gravity. Dr John M Epley, an Ear, Nose and Throat specialist changed the course of history and made an enormous difference to the lives of people suffering Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo (BPPV), the most common inner ear disorder which causes random, recurrent, and abrupt episodes of vertigo (an illusion or hallucination of movement) for which there had been no satisfactory treatment.
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