Diagnosis and Treatment of Acute Dizziness

Abstract

Acute vestibular symptoms, such as dizziness, vertigo and unsteadiness are common symptoms complained by patients referring to the emergency department. The first important challenge for physicians is to distinguish central serious causes of vertigo (for example cerebrovascular events) from peripheral. The current approach focuses on “timing” (duration of symptoms) and triggers, together with a complete neurological and ocular examination, is considered the best evidence for evaluating patients with dizziness. It also helps to prevent misdiagnoses and under-diagnoses, over consumption and wastage of resources, improper in-hospitalization, risk of mortality and co morbidity for patients. The current review focuses on dizziness and the current evaluation algorithms for diagnosis and treatment, such as various disorders that can be considered when performing differential diagnosis.