When you're dizzy, you may feel lightheaded, woozy, or disoriented. If you feel like you or the room are spinning, you have vertigo. These feelings may make you lose your balance.

Dizziness can have many different causes. A sudden drop in blood pressure or being dehydrated can make you dizzy. Many people feel lightheaded if they get up too quickly from sitting or lying down. Certain medicines and problems with your inner ear may cause dizziness. So can motion sickness. Sometimes dizziness can be a symptom of other disorders.

As people get older, they may have more health problems and take more medicines. This makes them more likely to have problems with dizziness and balance.

Dizziness usually gets better by itself or is easily treated. If you are dizzy often, you should see your health care provider to find the cause.

An imprecise term which may refer to a sense of spatial disorientation, motion of the environment, or lightheadedness.

Most people feel dizzy now and then. Kids, like adults, may occasionally feel lightheaded or unsteady. But if such feelings repeat or interfere with everyday life, it could be a sign of a balance disorder.

Most balance problems are temporary and easy to treat. But these problems may also signal a more serious condition that could have a lasting impact. Learn to recognize the signs of dizziness or balance problems that may warrant a trip to a doctor.

Experts have long suspected that dizziness and balance problems are often overlooked and untreated, but the scope of the problem wasn’t fully understood. That’s why NIH supported the largest national survey to date to uncover information about these disorders in children. The study included data on nearly 11,000 kids, ages 3 to 17.

The researchers found that more than 1 in 20 kids in the U.S. had a dizziness or balance problem, and only one-third of them received treatment in the previous year. “The findings suggest that dizziness and balance problems are fairly common among children,” says Dr. James F. Battey, Jr., a pediatrician and director of NIH’s National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders.

Our sense of balance is a complex process. It’s managed by signals between the brain, ears, eyes, and sensors in the joints and other body parts. This intricate system helps your body monitor and maintain its position as you move throughout the day, without you even having to think about it. But if any of these many sensory signals go wrong, it can weaken your sense of balance.

Balance disorders can make you stagger when walking. You might teeter or fall when trying to stand. Affected people might feel like they themselves or the world around them is spinning or moving—a condition known as vertigo. Other symptoms can include blurred vision, vomiting, diarrhea, confusion, and anxiety.

Common causes of balance problems in children range from ear infections, severe headaches, and certain medications to more serious neurological disorders, head or neck injuries, and genetic conditions. In many cases, the study’s researchers found, an underlying cause wasn’t reported.

Balance disorders can be difficult to recognize and understand. They can be especially hard to diagnose in young children. Kids may not know the right words to describe their symptoms. Affected children may talk about a “spinning feeling.” They may say their tummy or head feels bad or weird. They may walk unsteadily or seem clumsy.

“Parents who notice dizziness and balance problems in their children should consult a health care provider to rule out a serious underlying condition,” Battey says.

Your child’s pediatrician will likely ask questions about when the symptoms first appeared, how long they last, how often they occur, and what medications the child is taking. Your child’s eyes and ears will be examined, and hearing and balance may be tested. You may be referred to a specialist, such as an otolaryngologist—a doctor with expertise in the ear, nose, and throat.

Treatment will depend on the underlying cause. The good news is that most dizziness and balance problems in children are temporary and treatable. Still, it’s important to check with a health professional if you notice any problems.

Tell Your Doctor

Dizziness and balance problems may be hard to spot in children. Younger kids may lack the vocabulary to describe their symptoms. Talk with a health care provider if your child:

• falls frequently.
• seems unsteady upon standing or walking.
• feels as if the room is spinning around him/her.
• feels as if moving when standing or sitting still.
• feels as if she’s falling.
• feels lightheaded, or as if he might faint.
• says that vision becomes blurred.

An illusion of movement, either of the external world revolving around the individual or of the individual revolving in space. vertigo may be associated with disorders of the inner ear (ear, inner); vestibular nerve; brainstem; or cerebral cortex. Lesions in the temporal lobe and parietal lobe may be associated with focal seizures that may feature vertigo as an ictal manifestation. (From Adams et al., Principles of Neurology, 6th ed, pp300-1)

A brief, intense episode of vertigo triggered by a specific change in the position of the head. You might feel as if you're spinning when you bend down to look under something, tilt your head to look up or over your shoulder, or roll over in bed. BPPV occurs when loose otoconia tumble into one of the semicircular canals and affect how the cupula works. This keeps the cupula from flexing properly, sending incorrect information about your head's position to your brain, and causing vertigo. BPPV can result from a head injury, or can develop just from getting older.

A balance disorder is a condition that makes you feel unsteady or dizzy. If you are standing, sitting, or lying down, you might feel as if you are moving, spinning, or floating. If you are walking, you might suddenly feel as if you are tipping over.

Everyone has a dizzy spell now and then, but the term “dizziness” can mean different things to different people. For one person, dizziness might mean a fleeting feeling of faintness, while for another it could be an intense sensation of spinning (vertigo) that lasts a long time.

About 15 percent of American adults (33 million) had a balance or dizziness problem in 2008. Balance disorders can be caused by certain health conditions, medications, or a problem in the inner ear or the brain. A balance disorder can profoundly affect daily activities and cause psychological and emotional hardship.

Imagine reaching for something on a grocery shelf and suddenly feeling unsteady. Or looking over your shoulder to back up the car and having things start whirling around you. Most people feel dizzy now and then. But if that feeling persists or interferes with your daily life, it could be a sign of a balance disorder.

A balance disorder makes you feel as if you’re moving, spinning or floating, even though you’re quite still. More than 4 in 10 Americans will experience an episode of dizziness sometime during their lives that’s significant enough to send them to a doctor.

Dizziness can range from feeling lightheaded to woozy to disoriented. Feeling that you or your surroundings are spinning is called vertigo . Any of these sensations can be extremely distressing.

“Balance is a multisystem function,” explains NIH hearing and balance expert Dr. Daniel Sklare. It begins with a series of signals within the tiny balance organs of the inner ear. These organs work with your brain’s visual system to give you a sense of your body’s position. They also keep objects from blurring when your head moves. Sense receptors in skin, joints and muscles also send balance-related signals to the brain. The brain receives and coordinates information from all these different body systems. Balance disorders can arise when any of these signals malfunction.

Because balance is so complex, it can be hard to figure out the underlying cause of certain problems. Some balance disorders can begin suddenly. They might arise from an ear infection, a head injury or certain medications. Low blood pressure can lead to dizziness when you stand up quickly. Disorders related to vision, muscles, bones or joints can also contribute to balance problems.

“As America gets older, many people with imbalance have a collection of these problems,” says Dr. Gordon Hughes, NIH clinical trials director for hearing and balance. “They might have aging of the ear, aging of vision, cataracts, muscle weakness from losing some muscle mass or arthritis in the hips, plus other problems like diabetes.”

Researchers have identified more than a dozen different balance disorders. The most common is a sudden, often harmless burst of vertigo that might arise with an abrupt change in the position of the head, like when you bend over to tie your shoes. Technically known as benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPV), this condition can result from a head injury or simply from getting older. BPPV sometimes occurs when tiny calcium crystals in the inner ear become displaced. In that case, your doctor can treat BPPV by carefully moving the head and body to reposition these particles. An NIH-supported clinical trial showed that this treatment works well for BPPV.

Another common balance disorder is known as Ménière’s disease. It can develop at any age, but most often strikes adults between 40 and 60 years of age. Symptoms include intense vertigo, hearing loss, nausea, tinnitus (a ringing or buzzing in the ear) and a feeling of fullness in the ear. Ménière’s disease usually affects only one ear.

Some people with Ménière’s disease have single attacks of dizziness separated by long periods of time. Others may experience many attacks closer together over a number of days. Some affected people have vertigo so extreme that they lose their balance and fall. These episodes are called “drop attacks.”

An attack of Ménière’s symptoms, while not life-threatening, can feel completely overwhelming. The symptoms arise because of a change in fluid volume within the inner ear. But its underlying cause remains unknown. Scientists estimate that 6 in 10 people either get better on their own or can control their vertigo with diet, drugs or devices. In severe cases, surgical therapies can end the dizziness but might affect hearing.

NIH-funded researchers at the University of Washington are now exploring a new treatment option to stop a Ménière’s attack. An implant behind the ear is designed to control abnormal electrical activity in the nerve that sends balance information to the brain, bringing the sensation of spinning to a halt. The device is now being tested in clinical trials.

If you think you may have a balance disorder, talk with your health care provider. Your doctor can assess whether your symptoms might be caused by a serious disorder, such as a heart or blood condition. If an inner ear balance disorder is likely, you may be referred to a specialist such as an otolaryngologist, a doctor with expertise in the ear, nose and throat. You might receive a hearing test, a balance test and possibly an imaging study of the brain.

Work with your doctor to figure out how to cope with your dizziness on a daily basis and reduce your risk of injury. For example, wear low-heeled shoes or walking shoes outdoors. You might decide to try using a cane or walker. Safe, secure handrails in stairwells and grip handles in bathrooms can help make your home safer. Driving a car may be especially hazardous, so ask your doctor if it’s safe for you to drive.

A specialized rehabilitation therapist can give you a set of head, body and eye exercises to help reduce dizziness and nausea.

Meanwhile, researchers continue to work to develop new, more effective approaches. In one experimental rehabilitation strategy, now in clinical trials, scientists have created a “virtual reality” grocery store. It allows people with balance disorders to walk safely on a treadmill through computer-generated store aisles. While holding onto a grocery cart, they can look up and down, turn their heads and reach for items on virtual shelves. By doing this, they safely learn how to navigate an environment that can be challenging for someone with a balance problem.

“The key for people looking for treatment is to go to the best team of clinical experts that they can gain access to,” says Dr. Sklare. “It’s very important to get that level of assessment.”

Tell Your Doctor

Discuss your symptoms with a health care provider if:

• You often feel unsteady.
• You feel as if the room is spinning around you.
• You feel as if you’re moving when you know you’re standing or sitting still.
• You lose your balance and fall.
• You feel as if you’re falling.
• You feel lightheaded, or as if you might faint.
• Your vision becomes blurred.
• You sometimes feel disoriented, losing your sense of time, place or identity.