How To Treat BPPV At Home

What is BPPV?

BPPV (Benign paroxysmal positional vertigo) is the most common form of vertigo. This occurs when the calcium particles in your inner ear become dislodged and float into fluid-filled spaces of the inner ear, such as the semicircular canals.

These canals sense the rotation of the head, so the free floating particles do not cause symptoms until the head changes position. Head movements such as looking up or down, going from laying to sitting up or rolling over in bed will cause the particles to move to the lowest part of the canal.

This then causes the fluid to flow within the semi-circular canals which stimulates the balance nerve causing vertigo and nystagmus.

What causes BPPV?

BPPV can have a few possible causes. These include: mild/severe head trauma, inner ear infection, fever, damage to the inner ear or long periods positioned on your back e.g the dentists chair. BPPV can even occur after shaking the head too much! (The latter happened to my partner after he shook his head trying to get water out of his ears after the shower!) There is also evidence that BPPV can also be triggered by prolonged stress and anxiety, which was probably the case for me.

BPPV symptoms

BPPV causes a spinning sensation (vertigo) whenever the head moves. I have experienced BPPV a few times throughout my PPPD journey!

The symptoms are extremely uncomfortable. People can fall out of bed or lose their balance when they try to walk. Even the tiniest movement of the head can trigger a horrible spinning sensation. While spinning is the main symptom, BPPV can also cause mild unsteadiness in-between attacks.

Test for BPPV on your own

The below video shows you how to test for Posterior Canal BPPV using the dix hall pike manoeuvre. It then goes on to show you how to do the Epley Manoeuvre by yourself. There is another type of BPPV. Scroll down for more information!

Horiztonal Canal BPPV

The below video shows you how to test for Horizontal Canal BPPV using the BBQ Roll manoeuvre.

Can you have both BPPV and PPPD?

Unfortunately yes you can. For some people, BPPV is one of the things that triggers PPPD in the first place. Once the initial issue is resolved, the brain never learns to compensate, so you’re left with PPPD symptoms. This is often the case if the nervous system remains in the fight or flight state for a long period of time. The brain has created some “bad predictions” in the form of neural circuits, however you can rewire them.

Although you can have both BPPV and PPPD at once, you can easily treat BPPV! So at least that’s one less thing to worry about. PPPD will of course also resolve, however this may take more time as there is no manoeuvre to put things back in the right place!