Do you suffer from dizziness?
If you are dizzy, you may feel as though everything around you is spinning or that you feel light-headed. It is an unpleasant experience, and as many as 1 in 4 people will experience it at some point in their lives. Fortunately, dizziness is usually not serious. Targeted movement exercises can often effectively reduce the symptoms.
Possible causes of dizziness
Dizziness can have several causes, for example:
- problems with the balance organ in the ear
- sudden movements of the head
- tension or stress
- too little exercise
- illness or fatigue
A common form is positional vertigo (BPPD). This involves brief dizziness when turning over in bed, bending down or looking up. The dizziness usually lasts less than a minute.
Treatment of dizziness
There are different types of dizziness, and treatment is usually non-medicinal. It often consists of information and exercises or movements that you can do yourself. Only if the dizziness is accompanied by severe nausea and vomiting may medication sometimes be prescribed.
What can the physiotherapist do?
A physiotherapist can help you reduce dizziness symptoms by:
- explore together which movements trigger the symptoms
- explain what is happening in your body
- learn exercises to suit your symptoms
- guiding you step by step in moving
For positional vertigo (BPPD), the physiotherapist can perform special movements that often cause the dizziness to subside quickly.
Exercise for dizziness
Dizziness often involves exercises where you make the very movements that make you dizzy. This may sound contradictory, but it helps your brain to readjust. As a result, it reacts less violently to unexpected movements.
The exercises:
- start quietly and build up slowly
- do several times a day
- you can often perform at home
It is important to practise in a safe place, where you can sit down if necessary.
Online training for dizziness
Exercise is an effective remedy for dizziness. However, going out to exercise under the supervision of a doctor or physiotherapist is often difficult. That is why an online training programme has been developed that you can follow at home: the Vertigo Training.
During this training, you will make the movements with your head that cause dizziness. By consciously inducing this, your brain learns to adapt again. This enables it to cope better with dizziness when it occurs unexpectedly.
The exercises build up step by step. Once an exercise no longer makes you feel dizzy, you can move on to the next one. This allows you to gradually train your body further. Make sure you do the training in a place where you can easily sit down. The treatment lasts a total of six weeks.
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