Do migraine patients tend to have an increased risk of benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPV)?
“Migraine patients tend to have an increase risk of BPPV. No one has looked at vestibular migraines to distinguish that from just migraines but migraine patients in general have a slightly higher risk of BPPV. And one possibility there is, if you go back to animal studies, trigeminal noxious, trigeminal stimulation, can actually induce inflammatory changes in the inner ear. That may be a possibility. I think there was a question on the pathophysiology of migraine. So migraine is a disorder of the trigeminal cervical system where each of the trigeminal nerves and the upper cervical nerves all combine to control sensation, control pain. And so if you keep getting migraine attacks, this recurrent trigeminal activation, that could proceed theoretically cause some inflammation in your inner ear. Over time, that may be the cause of the increased risks of BPPV.”
RESOURCES & LINKS:
- This Q&A is an excerpt from the Vestibular Health Summit Sessions
- The Vestibular Health Summit Sessions are included with 360NeuroGO Premium
FACULTY:
Shin Beh, MD
Shin C. Beh, M.D., is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Neurology at UT Southwestern Medical Center. A neurologist, Dr. Beh is the founding Director of UT Southwestern’s Vestibular Neurology and Neuro-Visual Disorders Clinic and serves on the faculty of the Multiple Sclerosis and Neuroimmunology Clinic. Dr. Beh’s research interests include vestibular migraine, and various other neuro-otologic disorders. He has published a number of scholarly articles and book chapters and presented nearly 40 abstracts and invited lectures related to his specialty. Dr. Beh serves as a reviewer for journals that include JAMA Neurology; Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery & Psychiatry; Therapeutic Advances in Neurological Disorders; The Neurologist; and Neurodegenerative Disease Management.
