Vertigo (dizziness) refers to the subjective sensation of rotatory movement, either of the individual or of the environment, and having the difficulty to orientate the body in relation to surrounding subjects.
There can be many causes of vertigo (dizziness), some such as diseases involving the labyrinths, the vestibular portion of the eighth cranial nerve, and their nuclei and connections. Drug and chemical toxicity, hyperventilation syndrome, multiple sensory disorders, psychiatric disorders, brainstem cerebro-vascular accidents, other neurologic disorders, and cardiovascular disorders.
In Chiropractic, a common cause for vertigo (dizziness) is the dysfunction of the cervical spine. The vestibular nerve, which is a nerve that connects to your ear, contains the mechanisms which control your balance, also have connections with your neck. They then relay messages to and from the joints and muscles of your neck, (cervical spine), so that your head movements occur in such a way to assist in maintaining balance. If there is dysfunction in the joints of your neck (cervical spine), afferent input is altered, meaning messages going to and from your neck become abnormal, more specifically to the spinal cord and its interconnections with the vestibular nerve, causing the sensation of “dizziness” / vertigo.