Fitness Files: Cure grogginess with a Google search
A few years ago, my husband couldn’t roll out of bed without feeling dizzy. Our family doctor referred him to an otolaryngologist, who sent him home with a motion sickness prescription. Worse than dizziness, the meds made him groggy.
Still looking for relief from revolving-room syndrome and nausea, he consulted another doctor, who put him in a special chair and tipped it at an uncomfortable angle. The doctor, who called it the Epley maneuver, timed abrupt changes of Paul’s position from side to side.
“I’m cured,” Paul said, returning home after the chair-tipping rearranged the tiny crystals of the inner ear.
Every six months he’d need a tune-up, so he’d jump back in the tipping chair and come home with properly positioned inner ear crystals, and no more dizziness.
An inveterate do-it-yourself-er, Paul Googled his diagnosis, “positional vertigo,” and discovered the Brandt-Daroff exercises for vertigo. From then on, he did the exercises at home, alleviating the vertigo and wooziness.
A true believer, he proselytized to our dizzy friends, whisking Judy, a positional vertigo sufferer, away from a runner’s gathering and downstairs to our bedroom, where he closed the door, put her in our bed and demonstrated the Brandt-Daroff maneuver.
Runners guffawed over my husband being in the master bedroom with my lady friend. However, they missed my real embarrassment: We hadn’t made the bed.
What Paul and Judy suffered from is described on Mayoclinic.org as benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPV).
It says three loop-shaped semicircular canals containing “fluid and fine, hairlike sensors monitor the rotation of your head.” Against the walls of the inner ear, between the semicircular ducts and the cochlea, lie patches of hair cells topped by small calcium carbonate crystals.
These crystals monitor all head movements related to gravity. Because of trauma, whiplash, aging, ear diseases or other causes, these crystals become dislodged and move into one of the semicircular canals.
Whoa! Rolling over or sitting up causes destabilizing disequilibrium.
The Vestibular Disorders Assn. says the Brandt-Daroff exercises have been reported to reduce dizziness in 95% of cases.
During the next ear appointment, my husband handed the doctor a copy of the Brandt-Daroff exercises he’d copied from the Internet. “Why do doctors write prescriptions for motion sickness meds instead of handing out copies of Brandt-Daroff?” he asked.
“My patients won’t do the exercises,” the doctor answered.
Feelings of dizziness and nausea deserve a visit to the doctor. However, if benign paroxysmal positional vertigo is the diagnosis, doing the Brandt-Daroff Exercises at home can rid most sufferers of the symptoms.
Paul and his bedmate Judy are proof that the home remedy works.
Newport Beach resident CARRIE LUGER SLAYBACK is a retired teacher who ran the Los Angeles Marathon at age 70, winning first place in her age group. Her blog is lazyracer@blogspot.com.