Ménière'due south disease is a condition that causes vertigo, tinnitus, and progressive deafness. There is no cure, but some treatments can ease the symptoms.

According to the National Constitute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD), approximately 615,000 people in the United States take Ménière's disease. It can develop at any age, just it nigh commonly appears between 40 and 60 years of age. In most cases, information technology only affects i ear.

In this article, we explicate the symptoms, causes, and triggers of Ménière's disease, also equally natural and conventional treatments. We also recommend dietary changes that can help a person reduce the symptoms.

a woman holding her ear because she has a pain there from Meniere's disease Share on Pinterest
There is a variety of treatment options available that tin can ease the symptoms of Ménière'southward illness.

Although there is no cure, treatment can help manage some symptoms.

Lifestyle changes

Ménière'south disease has links with stress and anxiety. However, information technology is unclear whether stress and anxiety crusade symptoms of Ménière'southward disease, or whether the affliction leads to stress and anxiety.

Either way, stress and anxiety direction can help reduce the intensity of symptoms. People may discover that yoga, meditation, tai chi, or mindfulness helps them relax.

Research suggests that there is a link betwixt smoking and tinnitus, then quitting may help reduce this symptom.

Medications for vertigo

Doctors may recommend different types of drugs for vertigo. The options include:

  • Motility sickness drugs: These medications include meclizine (Antivert) and diazepam (Valium). They can aid with the spinning sensation that vertigo causes, besides as the nausea and vomiting.
  • Drugs for nausea: Prochlorperazine (Compazine) is an constructive medication for treating nausea during an episode of vertigo.
  • Diuretics: These drugs reduce fluid retention in the body. For Ménière's illness, doctors might prescribe a combination of triamterene and hydrochlorothiazide (Dyazide or Maxzide).

Reducing the corporeality of fluid that the body retains may improve the fluid volume and force per unit area in the inner ear. As a result, the severity and frequency of symptoms may subtract.

Centre ear injections

Doctors can inject some medications into the middle ear to improve symptoms of vertigo.

These drugs include the antibiotic gentamicin (Garamycin) and steroids, such as dexamethasone (Decadron).

Surgery

Surgery may be an option for people with Ménière's affliction if other treatments take non been effective, or if symptoms are severe. Surgical options include:

  • Endolymphatic sac decompression: A surgeon removes a small portion of os from around the endolymphatic sac. This membrane in the inner ear helps command water pressure in the ear. If it is non working correctly, this may contribute to vertigo.
  • Labyrinthectomy: A surgeon removes a portion of the inner ear.
  • Vestibular nervus section: A surgeon cuts the vestibular nerve.
  • Vestibular rehabilitation therapy: People may experience balance bug betwixt episodes of vertigo. A healthcare professional can instruct them on exercises and activities that may assist their trunk and encephalon regain the ability to process remainder.

People with hearing loss may benefit from a hearing aid.

Alternative handling

Bated from making adjustments to the nutrition and lifestyle, there are few natural options available to manage Ménière'southward disease.

Some herbs, such as ginger root and ginkgo biloba, may provide relief from vertigo symptoms in some people.

All the same, co-ordinate to the NIDCD, no testify supports using herbal supplements, acupuncture, or acupressure to treat Ménière's.

Herbal supplements may as well interact with existing medications. People who wish to endeavor these remedies should cheque with a doctor before taking them.

Positive pressure treatment

A few years ago, the Food and Drug Assistants (FDA) approved a device that can aid people who have Ménière'southward affliction.

This device releases modest pulses of air pressure into the middle ear. These pulses seem to interact with the fluid inside the ear to reduce dizziness.

The symptoms of Ménière's disease vary from person to person. They tin can occur suddenly, and their frequency and duration differ.

Doctors often refer to sudden symptoms as an attack. Ménière's attacks vary in length but typically last for betwixt 20 minutes and 24 hours.

Common symptoms that occur during an attack include:

Vertigo

Usually the most obvious symptom of Ménière's disease, vertigo can involve:

  • a spinning sensation, even while a person is stationary
  • dizziness
  • airsickness
  • nausea
  • irregular heartbeat
  • sweating

It is difficult to predict when a vertigo attack will occur. For this reason, it is important to have vertigo medication handy at all times.

Vertigo symptoms may interfere with several activities, including:

  • driving
  • operating heavy machinery
  • climbing ladders or scaffolding
  • swimming

Tinnitus

This persistent, disruptive noise in the ear may resemble the following sounds:

  • ringing
  • buzzing
  • roaring
  • whistling
  • hissing

People are generally more aware of it during quiet times or when they are tired.

Hearing loss

In a person with Méniére's illness, levels of hearing loss may fluctuate, especially early on in the disease's progression.

The person may too be more than sensitive to loud sounds. Eventually, almost people with Ménière'due south develop some degree of long-term hearing loss.

Anxiety, stress, and low

These psychological symptoms can also develop due to Ménière's illness. The condition is unpredictable and can adversely affect the individual's ability to work, especially if they have to climb ladders or operate mechanism.

As hearing gets progressively worse, people might find social interaction more challenging.

Some people with Ménière'southward lose the power to drive, further limiting their independence, task prospects, freedom, and access to friends and family. It is important for people who feel stress, anxiety, or depression to tell their doctor.

Ménière's can likewise have other effects throughout the body. We explore these in more item in the department beneath.

Ménière'due south affliction develops in two stages. Betwixt these stages, a person might not experience symptoms for extended periods.

Early

In its early stages, Ménière'south disease causes sudden and unpredictable episodes of vertigo.

During these episodes, there will be some loss of hearing, which typically returns to normal one time vertigo subsides. The ear may experience uncomfortable and blocked and take a sense of fullness or pressure. Tinnitus is also common in early stage Ménière's illness.

After a vertigo assault due to Ménière'southward affliction, a person often has extreme exhaustion and feels the need to sleep for hours.

People may also experience the post-obit during the early stages of the disease:

  • diarrhea
  • blurry vision
  • jerking eye movements
  • nausea
  • vomiting
  • cold sweat
  • palpitations or a rapid pulse
  • trembling

Late

Vertigo episodes become less frequent in the belatedly stages of the disease and, in some cases, never come back.

However, residual, hearing, and vision problems tin keep. Individuals volition feel especially unsteady when it is dark. Hearing and tinnitus usually get steadily worse.

A person might likewise experience driblet attacks. These involve spontaneously losing posture or of a sudden falling down while remaining conscious.

The most confusing characteristic of Ménière'southward disease is the sudden onset of vertigo attacks.

The private may have to prevarication down and miss out on social, leisure, piece of work, or family activities.

Vehicle licensing authorities in many countries state that people with a diagnosis of Ménière's disease must non drive.

These government will not permit the individual to drive until they receive a medico's confirmation that their symptoms are under command.

Sure dietary changes tin can help reduce fluid retention. Mostly, minimizing fluid retention will reduce the frequency and severity of the symptoms.

These measures may aid:

  • Eating more frequent simply smaller meals: Evenly distributing meals throughout the day helps regulate body fluids. Rather than eating three large meals a day, endeavor half-dozen smaller ones.
  • Eating less salt: The less salt a person consumes, the less fluid their trunk volition retain. People should avoid calculation salt to meals and cut out almost junk foods, as these are often high in added common salt.
  • Reduce booze intake: Alcohol tin adversely touch on the volume and limerick of the inner ear fluid.
  • Drink h2o regularly: Peoples with Ménière's disease should take item care to hydrate regularly during hot conditions and intense exercise.
  • Avert tyramine: This amino acrid is in a range of foods, including chicken liver, smoked meats, red wine, ripe cheeses, nuts, and yogurts. Information technology may trigger migraine, and people with Ménière's affliction should consider avoiding foods that contain it.

Ménière's disease may occur due to an abnormality in the structure of the inner ear or the fluid levels in it.

However, the exact reason why these changes develop is unclear.

The inner ear contains a cluster of connected passages and cavities called the labyrinth.

The outer part of the inner ear is home to the bony labyrinth. Inside, there is a soft membrane structure, which is a smaller version of the labyrinth, with a similar shape.

The membranous labyrinth contains a fluid called endolymph. It as well has hair-like sensors that reply to the fluid's movement and send messages to the brain through nerve impulses.

Dissimilar parts of the inner ear play roles in various types of sensory perception, such equally:

  • detecting acceleration in any management
  • rotational motility
  • sound

For all of the sensors in the inner ear to part fully, the pressure, book, and chemic composition of the fluid take to exist correct.

Sure features of Ménière'due south disease alter the properties of the inner ear fluid, triggering the disorienting effects of the disease.

Triggers

Certain stresses and emotional disturbances can trigger episodes of Ménière'southward symptoms, including working for likewise long, underlying health conditions, and tiredness.

Salt in the diet is another trigger.

No single test or scan can allow a md to diagnose Ménière's disease. The medico volition carry out an interview and physical examination, enquire about the person's medical and family unit history, and consider the signs and symptoms.

The doc will enquire about the following:

  • the severity of symptoms
  • how ofttimes symptoms occur
  • what medications the person has been taking
  • whatever previous problems with the ears
  • general wellness status
  • any history of infectious diseases or allergies
  • any family history of inner ear problems

Several other diseases and conditions have similar symptoms, which can arrive challenging to diagnose Ménière's disease.

Hearing loss

To establish the extent of hearing loss, a doctor will perform an audiogram.

An audiometer produces tones of varying loudness and pitch. The individual listens with headphones and indicates when they hear a sound or when a audio is no longer present.

Balance assessment

Many people with Ménière's disease experience some degree of difficulty with balance. A person'due south sense of rest may seem to resolve between episodes of vertigo.

Electronystagmography

A md introduces warm and absurd water or air into the ear canal. They and then measure involuntary middle movements in response to this simulation. Unusual responses may indicate an inner ear trouble.

Rotary chair testing

The individual sits on a chair in a small, dark booth. The doctor places electrodes nearly the person's optics, and a reckoner-guided chair gently rotates back and along at varying speeds.

The move stimulates the inner rest system and causes nystagmus, or eye movements. A reckoner and monitor records these with an infrared photographic camera.

Vestibular evoked myogenic potentials (VEMP) testing

This test measures the function of certain sensors in the inner ear that discover acceleration.

Posturography

The private wears a safety harness while standing barefoot on a special platform and trying to continue their balance nether various conditions.

Other tests

A doctor may wish to rule out other possible diseases and conditions, such equally a brain tumor or multiple sclerosis (MS). They may request the following scans to assist them practice this:

  • MRI browse
  • CT browse
  • Auditory brainstem response audiometry — which measures ear and brain function in response to sounds — to dominion out tumors

Ménière's disease has a complicated range of symptoms and is hard to diagnose and treat.

Attacks may be frequent or infrequent and cause stress, anxiety, and hearing loss. Periods of remission occur between episodes.

A person with Ménière's affliction should seek medical support, as several methods are available to manage the symptoms.