Abnormal visuo-vestibular interactions in vestibular migraine: a cross sectional study
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Vestibular migraine is among the commonest causes of episodic vertigo. Chronically, patients with vestibular migraine develop abnormal responsiveness to both vestibular and visual stimuli characterized by heightened self-motion sensitivity and visually-induced dizziness. Yet, the neural mechanisms mediating such symptoms remain unknown. We postulate that such symptoms are attributable to impaired visuo-vestibular cortical interactions, which in turn disrupts normal vestibular function. To assess this, we investigated whether prolonged, full-field visual motion exposure, which has been previously shown to modulate visual cortical excitability in both healthy individuals and avestibular patients, could disrupt vestibular ocular reflex and vestibular-perceptual thresholds of self-motion during rotations. Our findings reveal that vestibular migraine patients exhibited abnormally elevated reflexive and perceptual vestibular thresholds at baseline. Following visual motion exposure, both reflex and perceptual thresholds were significantly further increased in vestibular migraine patients relative to healthy controls, migraineurs without vestibular symptoms and patients with episodic vertigo due to a peripheral inner-ear disorder. Our results provide support for the notion of altered visuo-vestibular cortical interactions in vestibular migraine, as evidenced by vestibular threshold elevation following visual motion exposure.
Date Issued
2019-03-01
Date Acceptance
2018-11-26
Citation
BRAIN, 2019, 142 (3), pp.606-616
ISSN
1460-2156
Publisher
Oxford University Press (OUP)
Start Page
606
End Page
616
Journal / Book Title
BRAIN
Volume
142
Issue
3
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s) (2019). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Guarantors of Brain.This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse,distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Identifier
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30759189
PII: 5316319
Subjects
vestibular migraine
vestibular thresholds
visual motion adaptation
visuo-vestibular interaction
Publication Status
Published
Coverage Spatial
England
Date Publish Online
2019-02-12