Dizziness is more than just feeling a little woozy: Patients can feel faint or that the world is spinning around them. Some patients may have temporary dizziness; with chronic cases, symptoms last longer than a month. Signs of dizziness can cause concern in patients. According to the Merck Manual Home Edition, "dizziness accounts for about five to six percent of visits to the doctor." While patients at any age can suffer from dizziness, Merck points out that it becomes more common with older patients.
Faintness
One of the first signs of dizziness is feeling faint, according to the Merck Manual Home Edition. When a patient is feeling faint, she feels like she is going to pass out while she is standing up. This sensation is called orthostatic hypotension, where the patient's blood pressure drops when she is upright. The faintness sign of dizziness can be caused by a variety of medical conditions, including dehydration, severe blood loss, aortic valve stenosis, abnormal heart rhythms, overmedication, diabetic autonomic neuropathy and multisystem atrophy.
Loss of Balance
Another sign of dizziness, according to the Merck Manual Home Edition, is a loss of balance. When the patient is standing, he feels unsteady and that he is going to fall, but the patient's muscle strength has not been affected. Causes of the loss of balance feeling are inner ear disorders, cerebellar disorders, basal ganglia disorders, neuropathy, spinal cord disease, visual disturbances, overmedication and alcohol intoxication.
Vertigo
A common sign of dizziness, vertigo, is where the patient feels like her surroundings are spinning, according to the Merck Manual Home Edition. According to the Neurology Channel, "some patients describe a feeling of being pulled toward the floor or toward one side of the room." Vertigo may get worse when the patient moves her head, turns while lying down or while changing positions. Medical conditions that can result in this sign of dizziness are benign paroxysmal positional vertigo, vestibular neuritis, Meniere's disease, middle ear infections, migraine, motion sickness, vertebrobasiliar insufficiency, multiple sclerosis and drugs that are toxic to the inner ear.
Lightheaded
The last sign of dizziness, according to the Merck Manual Home Edition, is feeling lightheaded. If the patient is feeling lightheaded, his reactions can vary greatly. He may feel giddy, detached or trapped in a panic attack. Hyperventilation, anxiety disorders and depression can cause this lightheaded feeling.
