Meniere’s, migraine, and motion sickness

Abstract

Conclusion: Elevated Motion Sickness Susceptibility (MSS) in Meniere?s disease (MD) is likely to be a consequence of the onset of MD and not migraine per se.

Objectives: Pathologies of the vestibular system influence MSS. Bilateral vestibular deficits lower MSS, vestibular neuritis or benign paroxysmal positional vertigo have little overall effect, whereas vestibular migraine elevates MSS. However, less is known about MSS in MD, a condition in which many patients experience vestibular loss and migraine symptoms.

Methods: The authors conducted an online survey that posed diagnostic and disease questions before addressing frequency of headaches, migraines, visual display dizziness (VDD), syncope, social life, and work impact of dizziness (SWID4) and motion sickness susceptibility (MSSQ). The two groups were: diagnosed MD individuals with hearing loss (n = 751) and non-MD individuals in the control group (n = 400).

Results: The MD group showed significantly elevated MSS, more headache and migraine, increased VDD, higher SWID4 scores, and increased syncope. MSS was higher in MD than controls only after the development of MD, but not before, nor in childhood. Although elevated in MD compared with controls, MSS was lower than migraine patients from past data. Multivariate analysis revealed VDD, SWID4, and MSS in adulthood as the strongest predictors of MD, but not headache nor migraine.

Keywords:

• Motion sickness
• Meniere’s disease
• migraine
• headache
• vestibular

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank the Meniere’s Society (UK) and to thank all those who participated in this survey.

Disclosure statement

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.