Dizziness is a common ailment that can occur with excessive fatigue, hypoxia or dehydration of the body. They do not necessarily mean that you are seriously ill, but they can be effective in hindering your daily activities and even making you feel sick. It turns out that over 50% of people over 65 suffer from dizziness after getting out of bed or armchair. Why is this happening and is it possible to prevent it?
Dizzinessmay or may not foreshadow a latent disease. There can be a lot of reasons for the appearance of dizziness after changing positions. However, their regular occurrence should not be ignored. If you feel that negative symptoms occur regularly for several weeks, see your doctor who will help you identify the source of the problem.
Dizziness: body upright and blood pressure change
When lying down or resting in a comfortable armchair, our body is relaxed and the blood remains evenly distributed throughout the venous system. When standing up abruptly, the force of gravity causes a large part of the blood (up to 1 liter - or about 1/5 of the entire blood volume) to remain in the lower limbs.
Blood is harder to return to the heart, and this translates to a smaller ejection volume per circumference. As a result, blood pressure drops throughout the system. Such a decline is otherwise known as orthostatic hypotension and is a completely physiological phenomenon.
Sudden fluctuations in pressure may be dangerous for the functioning of the body and disrupt its homeostasis. Therefore, nature has equipped the human body with special sensors, called baroreceptors, which monitor arterial pressure and transmit information to the circulatory regulation center, which is part of the autonomic nervous system. This center is located in the medulla in the brain and can "control" the functions of the circulatory system, depending on changing conditions.
If the blood pressure drops, the baroreceptors receive a very small amount of the stimulus, and the circulatory regulatory center stimulates the sympathetic nervous system. The secreted neurotransmitters cause, inter alia, narrowingblood vessels, increase in heart rate and stroke volume.
As a result, blood pressure rises again. If, on the other hand, the pressure becomes too high, the baroreceptors will be reactivated, which will signal the parasympathetic system to slow down the heart rate and dilate the blood vessels. In this way - on the basis of feedback - the cycle closes.
Dizziness: orthostatic reaction and symptoms of its disturbance
The reaction of a given individual to the upright standing of the body is sometimes assessed in the so-called orthostatic test performed in a doctor's office. During this test, the test person lies down for 10 minutes, after which the heart rate and systolic pressure are measured.
Then the patient takes a standing position, and after 2 minutes the measurements are repeated. The obtained results make it possible to indirectly estimate the physical capacity of the tested person.
This assessment, however, does not apply to older people. A properly functioning autonomic nervous system should efficiently regulate changes in blood pressure and heart function. However, in some people, the response to changing body position may be significantly delayed or even impaired. Symptoms such as:
- dizziness,
- feeling of darkness in front of the eyes,
- fainting or falls,
- pains in the back of the head.
What can make you feel dizzy?
Excessive pressure reduction resulting from a change in body position occurs several times more often in the elderly, which may result from the natural aging process of the nervous system or failure of the autonomic system.
Occasionally, recurrent dizziness in patients over 65 is also the first symptom of a progressive neurodegenerative disease such as Parkinson's disease. In younger people, dizziness and fainting immediately after standing up, however, may have a completely different background, resulting, for example, from:
- dehydration of the body,
- untreated diabetes,
- alcohol consumption,
- taking diuretics or vasodilators
- vitamin B12 deficiency
- or labyrinth diseases, which are e.g. a complication after a viral infection.
If the symptoms are rather occasional, they should not be a sign of a serious illness and should not be a cause for concern. However, if dizziness occurs more often or is accompanied by severe imbalances - specialist neurological diagnostics will be necessary.
Dizziness - how can you help yourself?
One of theThe most effective ways to minimize dizziness when changing body position is to keep the body hydrated.
Water shortages not only have a negative impact on headaches and dizziness, but also overall fatigue and endurance of the body or the condition of the skin.
How much water should we drink during the day? Currently, it is believed that 1 milliliter of water should be consumed for 1 calorie consumed.
So if you consume an average of about 2,000 calories in your daily diet, you should drink 2 liters of water proportionally. It is worth noting here that nothing hydrates the body's cells like clean water - so we should definitely not include coffee or tea in the daily fluid balance.
The dizziness associated with standing up can also be a signal of exhaustion and sleep deprivation that our body demands. In the whirlwind of work and excess duties, it's easy to forget that an adult needs 7 to 9 hours of sleep a day to stay he althy.
In school-age children, this value should be up to 10 hours. It is also worth taking care of regular basic blood tests and blood pressure measurements to help detect any abnormalities early.