What I suspected about a year and a half ago is now once again under consideration. Could I have inner ear damage on both sides, and could that be the cause of my continual symptoms?
After modifying my supplement regimen, I tried to reach out to my neurologist and the person who did the oVEMP and ocular counter roll tests to see if they would consider that my issues stem from inner ear damage caused by vestibular neuritis instead of migraine. I’d already spoken to my ENT doctor, and he basically would cut me off anytime I tried to mention inner ear damage, so I definitely didn’t feel it would be worth it to try to talk to him. Neither one seemed to be on board with what I was thinking. Frustrated, I began to see if I could get another opinion elsewhere. A big part of me just wanted to throw in the towel and get on with my life doing what I already found would help, but there was still a part of me that wanted to know what was truly going on and get confirmation of it. I also wanted to have a place to go if things got worse down the road and I would need additional treatment. I finally got connected with an ENT clinic not much further from home than the ENT clinic where I was tested initially. I was eventually scheduled for additional testing at another location for that clinic. A physical therapist would be doing the testing. I was going there for tests that I had not had done to this point, so I anxiously awaited the appointment, wondering what I would find out.
The clinic where I was to have the tests was just over an hour from home. I arrived for the appointment early and saw that there was a main therapy room with smaller rooms off to the side. One of those rooms was set up with testing equipment. The therapist did some initial testing in the main area. After the testing in the main area, she took me to the room with the testing equipment and fit me with the Frenzel goggles. She started out with some of the tests that I’d had done before, but then she had me hold my head downward while she shook it from side to side. She then stopped and viewed my eye movements. She seemed to think from that movement that there might be a hypofunction on the left side. Previous testing found nothing on the left but just on the right. She did other tests and finally ended with a skull vibration test. She said that the skull vibration test was an even stronger indicator of the hypofunction previously found on the left side. After completing her testing, she scheduled me to return for a computerized dynamic posturography (CDP) test and to begin therapy exercises. While I’m not thrilled about returning to the therapy exercises (and I’m not sure I’m going to agree to do them), I’m very interested to see what the CDP test shows.
My main question at this point is if the abnormal oVEMP and ocular counter roll test results on the right side from earlier this year and now the abnormal head shake and skull vibration test results on the left side point to a bilateral vestibular hypofunction. When I suspected it last time, I thought it made a lot of sense. Once I found out that there were inner ear tests that were not done, I started to wonder if damage to both inner ears might be the reason for my continual vestibular symptoms. After the episode of vestibular neuritis that I thought I had in 2015, I did what I thought I was supposed to do and thought I had gotten through it until 2018 when I noticed vestibular symptoms returning. Why did those symptoms come back, and why do I continue to have them in spite of my best efforts to address them? When the clinic at the beginning of the year only found an abnormality on the right (and bizarrely claimed it was from migraine), I figured there must be some neurological issue that was keeping me from compensating, like the neurotransmitter imbalance or the stress response. However, accounting for those issues, while they helped greatly, have not eliminated my symptoms. Could a bilateral vestibular hypofunction really be the root cause of these issues? I hope that the doctors and other medical professionals at the clinic I’m now using will be able to help me figure that out.
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