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Dizziness and balance problems
A guide for patients and carers
What other symptoms could I have?
Even when your dizziness is caused by inner ear problems you may not suffer from any hearing problems. If you do, you are likely to have either tinnitus - a ringing or buzzing noise in one or both ears - or various degrees of hearing loss. As mentioned above, the closeness of the hearing and balance organs explains why you may experience hearing disorders in the course of your dizziness. Your doctor may also wish to know whether you have experienced any numbness, clumsiness or weakness in your legs, which may contribute to your unsteadiness.
They may also ask you whether you have or have had double vision, numbness in your face or trouble with your speech, to establish if other nerves in your face or head are involved, and they will spend some time enquiring about the circumstances in which your dizziness occurs - whether it starts spontaneously, or completely out of the blue; whether it first started after you had the ’flu; or whether it appears to be related to the movements or position of your head. If you have had repetitive ear infections with ear discharge, the dizziness you experience could indicate that the balance organs in the ear are being affected by a previous or current infection. Accurate answers to these sorts of questions are very useful for your doctor.
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