Why am I dizzy? 10 causes

Dizziness refers to a range of sensations, such as feeling as though the room is spinning, lightheadedness, and feeling physically unsteady. Dizziness has many possible causes, which may relate to a person’s external environment, the medications they take, or an underlying condition.

Recurring dizziness or severe dizzy spells can significantly interfere with a person’s life. It rarely indicates a medical emergency, however. People can experience dizziness after:

• spinning around quickly
• standing or sitting up too fast
• engaging in high-intensity exercise

Usually, people will be able to identify the cause of their dizziness. However, this symptom may occur unexpectedly or without any clear reason.

The causes of dizziness can range from temporary physical changes to more serious underlying medical conditions, some of which we will detail below.

Many people use the terms “vertigo” and “dizziness” interchangeably.

Although these conditions create similar sensations, they are slightly different.

When someone feels dizzy, they can feel woozy or disoriented. Vertigo, on the other hand, refers to the artificial sensation of movement. Vertigo can cause people to feel as though the environment around them is spinning or tilting.

Vertigo occurs due to the development of problems in the inner ear. Causes of vertigo can include:

Benign paroxysmal positional vertigo

Benign paroxysmal positional vertigo develops when calcium carbonate particles collect in the inner ear canals.

These canals send information about the body’s position and movements to the brain, but the presence of the calcium particles causes the brain to misread the information.

Ménière’s disease

This inner ear condition has no known cause, but some scientists believe that it can occur when fluid builds up in the ear canals.

Ménière’s disease can develop suddenly and without any apparent cause. It can give rise to vertigo, a ringing or roaring sound in the ears, and hearing loss.

Labyrinthitis

Infections can cause inflammation in the inner ear, or labyrinth. Labyrinthitis tends to develop after a viral infection, such as a cold or flu.

Antiviral and antihistamine medications can effectively treat labyrinthitis. However, parts of the inner ear may sustain permanent damage as a result of this condition.

Repetitive motion from being in a vehicle, such as a car, airplane, or boat, can disrupt the structures of the inner ear, causing dizziness, nausea, and vomiting. People call this “motion sickness” or “seasickness.”

Being pregnant or taking certain medications can increase a person’s sensitivity to motion and increase their risk of experiencing motion sickness. The symptoms of motion sickness usually subside away once the person sets foot on solid ground.

A migraine is a type of recurring headache that can cause a throbbing or pulsing pain on one side of the head. The American Migraine Foundation estimate that 30–50% of people will experience dizziness during a migraine episode.

Sometimes, people experience dizziness before the onset of a migraine episode. Other neurologic symptoms, or auras, can precede the pain of a migraine headache. Auras can affect a person’s vision, speech, and motor control.

A sharp drop in blood pressure can cause a brief sensation of lightheadedness. Blood pressure changes can occur after sitting or standing up too quickly.

Other conditions that can cause blood pressure changes include:

• dehydration
• blood loss
• severe allergic reaction, or anaphylaxis
• pregnancy

Taking certain medications, such as diuretics, beta-blockers, or antidepressants, can also cause changes in blood pressure.

Conditions that affect the cardiovascular system, such as the buildup of plaque in the arteries and congestive heart failure, can cause dizziness. People may experience dizziness or feel lightheaded before or after a heart attack or stroke.

If a person has cardiovascular disease, they will likely experience other signs and symptoms, including:

• irregular heartbeat
• shortness of breath
• discomfort or tightness in the chest
• a persistent cough
• excess fluid in the arms, legs, or feet
• fatigue
• nausea, vomiting, or both

Share on PinterestEating a diet rich in iron can reduce the symptoms of anemia.

Iron deficiency can result in a condition called anemia, in which the body does not have enough oxygen-rich blood.

Anemia can cause the following symptoms:

• dizziness
• shortness of breath
• chest pain
• fatigue

Making appropriate dietary changes and taking iron supplements can help treat mild forms of iron-deficiency anemia. People who have a severe iron deficiency may require a blood transfusion.

Hypoglycemia occurs when blood glucose, or blood sugar, falls below the normal levels. Causes of hypoglycemia include:

• skipping meals
• consuming alcohol
• taking certain medications, such as insulin or aspirin
• having hormonal imbalances

Symptoms of hypoglycemia can appear suddenly and vary in severity. A few of these symptoms include:

• dizziness or lightheadedness
• loss of balance
• fatigue
• headache
• hunger
• mood changes
• difficulty concentrating
• irregular heartbeat

Autoimmune inner ear disease (AIED) refers to any condition wherein the immune system mistakenly attacks the inner ear. AIED can cause hearing loss in one or both ears.

Other symptoms of AIED include:

• dizziness
• tinnitus, or ringing in the ears
• loss of balance or coordination

AIED causes nonspecific symptoms that are similar to those of an ear infection. For doctors to accurately diagnose AIED, they need to take a full medical history, perform a physical examination, and track any additional symptoms.

People who have AIED may develop another autoimmune disease that affects the entire body.

Share on PinterestStress and anxiety are common symptoms of dizziness.

Long-term or chronic stress may contribute to the development of significant health problems, such as depression, anxiety, heart disease, diabetes, or immune dysfunction.

During the stress response, the brain releases hormones that affect the respiratory and cardiovascular systems.

These hormones narrow the blood vessels, raise the heart rate, and cause rapid, shallow breathing. These responses can lead to dizziness or lightheadedness.

Other symptoms of stress include:

• sweating
• trembling or shaking
• headaches
• chest pain
• rapid heartbeat
• difficulty sleeping
• difficulty concentrating
• nausea

Dizziness is a common symptom of anxiety. However, the exact relationship between the two varies among people.

Some people may experience anxiety attacks that trigger dizziness, while others might have a sudden onset of dizziness that triggers an anxiety attack.

Stressful events, such as an exam or a challenging emotional situation, can trigger anxiety attacks. People may feel dizzy, disoriented, and nauseous during an anxiety attack.

Other symptoms of anxiety include:

• worry
• restlessness or fidgeting
• difficulty concentrating
• sleep problems
• mood changes
• irritability
• rapid heart rate
• headache
• sweating
• dry mouth

Dizziness may indicate a more serious underlying medical condition when it occurs alongside symptoms such as:

• double vision
• vomiting
• fever
• numbness
• difficulty moving or controlling the arms or legs
• headache
• chest pain
• loss of consciousness

Experiencing an episode of sudden or severe dizziness can be alarming. However, the dizziness usually resolves on its own and does not require emergency medical attention.

Dizziness is a nonspecific symptom that can indicate an underlying medical condition, such as anxiety, stress, or low blood sugar.

People should speak with their healthcare provider if they experience severe or recurring dizziness.

Dizziness – NHS

It’s common to sometimes feel dizzy, lightheaded or off-balance, and it’s not usually serious. See a GP if you’re worried.

Check if you have dizziness

Dizziness includes feeling:

• off-balance
• giddy
• lightheaded or faint
• like you’re spinning or things around you are spinning (vertigo)

How you can treat dizziness yourself

Dizziness usually goes away on its own. But there are things you can do to take care of yourself while you’re feeling dizzy.

Do

• lie down until the dizziness passes, then get up slowly

• move slowly and carefully

• get plenty of rest

• drink plenty of fluids, especially water

• avoid coffee, cigarettes, alcohol and drugs

Don’t

• do not bend down suddenly

• do not get up suddenly after sitting or lying down

• do not do anything that could be dangerous while you’re dizzy, like driving, climbing a ladder or using heavy machinery

Non-urgent advice: See a GP if:

• you’re worried about your dizziness or vertigo
• it will not go away or it keeps coming back
• you’re finding it harder to hear or speak
• there’s ringing or other sounds in your ears (tinnitus)
• you have double vision, blurred vision or other changes in your eyesight
• your face, arms or legs feel numb or weak
• you have other symptoms like changes to your pulse, fainting or collapsing, headaches, feeling or being sick

Causes of dizziness

If you have other symptoms, this might give you an idea of the cause. Do not self-diagnose. See a GP if you’re worried.

Dizziness while you’re ill with something else

Dizziness often goes away after you’re treated for something else. For example:

• an ear infection
• migraine
• dehydration or heat exhaustion
• stress or anxiety
• low blood sugar (hypoglycaemia) because of diabetes
• iron deficiency anaemia
• motion sickness

Dizziness for no obvious reason

Page last reviewed: 21 April 2023
Next review due: 21 April 2026

Dizziness – causes, prevention and treatment

Dizziness. A condition in which it seems to a person that the objects around him and (and) his own body are moving or rotating in a certain direction (systemic dizziness). But often a person cannot say exactly in which direction he and everything around him are moving (non-systemic dizziness). It happens that a person notes only his own instability and instability (staggering, trembling) of the space around him, a feeling of tilting his head, moving his legs and torso in one direction (more often upwards), and his head in the other (more often downwards in a supine position), feeling falling into the abyss. Dizziness occurs when the work of the organs of vision and the central nervous system is inconsistent, which is responsible for the sense of body position in space (kinesthetic) and the sense of balance (vestibular).

Symptoms and course

There are many reasons for dizziness. Treatment of dizziness in people can also occur in absolutely healthy people, for example, when looking down from a great height or when looking at clouds, if you stand near a high-rise building – then there is a feeling that it is not the clouds that are moving, but the building tilts. Dizziness occurs if you spin for a long time around its axis, and then stop.

Dizziness as a manifestation of the disease can be caused by a disease of the inner ear, when the vestibular (balance) apparatus is affected by an inflammatory or tumor process. Such patients usually suffer from inflammation of the inner ear (otitis media) for a long time, first they have hearing loss, and then dizziness appears. With a tumor lesion, seizures occur against the background of hearing loss, ringing in the ear, and attacks of dizziness gradually become more frequent and intensify.

Dizziness is very common with a sharp turn of the head to the side, when getting out of bed in the morning, tilting the head back (during wallpapering, hanging clothes, removing a book from the top shelf), with a long tilt of the head to the side or anteriorly (weeding, car repair, long sleep in the train or bus), sometimes when walking “throws to the side.” Such dizziness is caused by spasm or clamping of the vertebral artery, which supplies blood to the parts of the brain responsible for balance. Dizziness can occur with high or low blood pressure, poisoning, fluid loss (vomiting, diarrhea) or blood loss (bleeding). Accompanied by dizziness and anemia (lack of erythrocytes in the blood – red blood cells), high fever.

Recognition of dizziness is simple, based on the patient’s complaints, symptoms characteristic of dizziness treatment (drunk gait, patient’s attempts to grab surrounding objects, inability to stand or sit, frequent rhythmic twitching of the eyes (when looking to the side or up).

Treatment and first aid

If the patient is dizzy, lay him on his back so that his head, neck and shoulders lie on the pillow, because in this position the kink of the vertebral arteries is excluded. You should avoid turning your head to the side, you need to open the windows, ventilate the room, put a cold bandage on your forehead, you can slightly moisten it with vinegar. After measuring the pressure and temperature, take measures to normalize them, if the heart rate is more than 100 beats per minute or an irregular heartbeat has appeared, and if nausea and repeated (more than 3 times) vomiting have joined dizziness, you need to call an ambulance. The prognosis depends on the nature of the dizziness.

causes, symptoms and diagnosis, indications for visiting a doctor

There is nothing pleasant about feeling dizzy – we feel anxiety, we can get injured. What is dizziness and how can it be caused? Should I ignore it, as is often the case with dizziness in men, drink self-chosen pills, as women often do with dizziness, or immediately go to the doctor? How to help yourself during an attack? Let’s consider these and other questions in more detail.

Symptoms of dizziness

Vertigo (medical term “vertigo”) is disorientation in space. It seems to a person that he is rotating, moving, although in fact he is motionless. It happens the other way around – there is a feeling that everything around is spinning and moving – objects, trees, the ground under your feet.

Sensations can be different – from rotational movements, to the impression of instability, when everything around (or yourself) trembles, staggers, moves. The body or parts of it may appear to be moving. Describing their condition, many say that they feel like with a strong sea roll, riding on a swing.

Additional symptoms when dizzy:

• Feeling dizzy.
• An illusion of mobility of your body or surrounding objects is created.
• There is nausea, weakness, up to fainting.
• Cold sweat breaks out.
• Increased heart rate.
• Fear, panic appears.
• Numb legs or arms.
• Impaired hearing or disturbed by ringing in the ears.

Dizziness can be sharp for several seconds or longer – up to half an hour, an hour and a constant feeling. The frequency of seizures is also different – someone encounters them regularly under certain conditions, while someone has experienced only a couple of times in their lives. Some patients notice frequent patterns when dizziness occurs. It can be trips in transport, experiences.

Causes of dizziness

They can be conditionally divided into physiological – normal, which do not serve as a symptom of diseases, and situations when vertigo signals some kind of illness, failure in the body.

The main causes of dizziness in a healthy person:

• Sudden fright, when there is a sharp release of stress hormones.
• Unusual and abrupt movements, such as skydiving, rides, spinning in circles for a long time.

With dizziness, the body warns us that something is not right with it at:

• Strong alcohol intoxication.
• Rigid and unbalanced diets.
• Dehydration, heat stroke.
• Excessive physical exertion.
• Decreased sugar levels.
• Low blood pressure.
• Taking certain medications (this side effect is indicated in the instructions).

Among the causes of dizziness in women may be pregnancy and heavy menstruation.

But not everything is so harmless with vertigo. This symptom can be in a variety of diseases. There are about eighty of them in total.

Major diseases, conditions that cause dizziness:

• Pathologies of the ENT organs that affect the inner ear (it serves as an element of the vestibular apparatus) – otitis media, Meniere’s disease and others.
• Circulatory disorders of the brain, vascular pathologies – aneurysms, VVD, stroke.
• Tumors of any nature in the brain, neck, cranial structures.
• Degenerative changes in the brain – multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease and others.
• Inflammatory and other diseases of the central nervous system – meningitis, encephalomyelitis and others.
• Cardiovascular diseases – infarction, cardiac arrhythmias, arterial hypertension and hypotension.
• Mental illness – phobias, neurotic syndrome.
• Osteochondrosis of the cervical spine.

What to do if you feel dizzy

During an attack, it is advisable not to turn your head to the side, not to make sudden movements, for example, try to lie down immediately. You can sit down, lie down gradually, focus on deep breathing. You can wash your face, make a cold compress on your face.

If vertigo recurs, attacks become more severe, there are additional symptoms – take action and consult a doctor

It is necessary to understand the symptom of what disease is dizziness.