The Diagnosis and Treatment of the Cervical Vertigo / 대한이비인후과학회지

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Vertigo is an illusion of environmental movement due to various causes, thus it is hard for medical doctors to determine the exact kind of dizziness in the final diagnosis. Recently, cervical vertigo was reported from several vertigo cases. Cervical vertigo is defined as sensation of rotation, resulting from an alteration of the neck proprioceptive afferents of the upper cervical spine. The aim of our study is to document the clinical features and the treatment outcomes in vertigo patients with myofascial pain syndrome (MPS). SUBJECTS AND METHOD: A total of 488 patients, excluding 18 patients who received other diagnosis, were examined to investigate the reasons for dizziness. We evaluated 34 patients, who were diagnosed with cervical vertigo by questionnaire after MPS treatments. Clinical evaluations for cervical vertigo were performed on all subjects, and vestibular function tests were also performed in patients with vertigo symptoms. All patients received a total of 4 treatments including trigger point injection, physical therapy or medication, and then followed up, respectively. The symptom changes of dizziness, patient satisfaction and cervical pain were checked before and treatment 1, 2, 4 times by Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) score. RESULTS: There were significant improvement in the VAS score of dizziness, patient satisfaction and cervical pain after treatment for MPS. CONCLUSION: Treatment for MPS could improve dizziness in cervical vertigo with MPS patients, but further study is needed to clearly confirm the cervical vertigo with MPS for improving patient's quality of life.