Exercises and Strategies to Ease Vertigo Symptoms

You stand up suddenly and your body sways, your stomach lurches, and the world around you spins. These sensations aren’t exactly making you feel all that confident on your feet, and you’re worried about falling and hurting yourself. 

Not to mention, you left your love of dizziness back in childhood.

Around 40% of adults in the United States experience vertigo at least once in their lives, but some people find themselves dealing with an ongoing condition in which vertigo is a side effect. 

Board-certified neurologist Dr. Paul Gill is no stranger to helping patients with vertigo here at Gill Neuroscience. While we can do our part to make your world a little more steady, there are some exercises and practices that you can do on your own, and we review four of them here.

What’s causing your vertigo

When patients come to us complaining of vertigo, our first order of business is to figure out what’s causing the symptom. 

There are many different roads to dizziness, and middle ear issues like benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPV) lead the charge (your middle ear is responsible for balance).

Other causes of vertigo include:

• Stroke
• Brain injury
• Certain medications
• Vestibular neuritis
• Migraines
• Diabetes
• Hypotension (low blood pressure)
• Multiple sclerosis

This list is far from complete, but we wanted to illustrate the wide range of possibilities. So, as you can see, it’s important that we first identify the underlying cause of your vertigo and treat that issue to restore steadiness to your life.

Best practices for managing vertigo on your own

As we work on the medical solutions for your vertigo, there are some effective practices that you can try at home to manage your dizziness.

Do vertigo exercises

If your vertigo is the result of BPPV — a condition in which you have displaced calcium carbonate crystals in your middle ear — there are a series of positional exercises that can really help reset your balance centers. These vestibular rehabilitation exercises include:

• Brandt-Daroff exercises
• Semont maneuver
• Epley maneuver
• Foster maneuver

Rather than trying to explain them here, we suggest you follow this link for detailed descriptions of these exercises, as well as video demonstrations. We’ll also show them to you in person when you’re at our office.

Try yoga

Another way to encourage better balance and combat vertigo is through yoga. Doing slow, purposeful poses in which you focus on balance and strength rebalances your body.

Stay safe during a vertigo attack

When you’re in the middle of a vertigo attack, there are a few steps we want you to take so you don’t lose your balance and hurt yourself. First, sit or lie down and try not to move your head. It can also be helpful to turn out the lights and lie in the dark for a moment.

Once you feel the dizziness pass, get up very slowly and and take a few steps to make sure the vertigo is gone.

Preventing vertigo

If you want to avoid an attack of vertigo, we suggest that you take your medications and do your exercises. There are also some other small steps you can take, such as sleeping with your head slightly elevated and squatting instead of bending over, that can prevent or minimize vertigo.

Between our treatments and some effective practices on your end, we can get your vertigo under control and make your world a little more stable.

For expert care of your vertigo, please call our office in Houston, Texas, at 832-912-7777, or use our online request form to schedule an appointment.