UPPER PENINSULA, Mich. (WJMN) – If you’re someone who experiences vertigo, dizziness, or imbalance, there is a rehabilitation therapy available to help reduce those symptoms.

Corin Swartz, a physical therapist with Aspirus Keweenaw, shares what this type of therapy is.

“Vestibular rehab is a specific type of rehab within the profession of physical therapy that is related to patients who are experiencing any type of vertigo, which is a spinning sensation or dizziness which is just a general sense of either lightheadedness or off balance or even with falling and other problems like that,” said Swartz.

Swartz explains what she does with her patients who are going through vestibular rehab.

“Depending on what their symptoms are sometimes I may just be doing a simple repositioning maneuver of their head especially if they have benign vertigo. Other times I’m giving them exercises either to help with their eye and their inner ear connection and or their brain. So sometimes I’m giving them body movements like getting up really fast laying down really fast and rolling to both sides,” said Swartz. “Sometimes it involves balance exercises like standing really, with your feet really close together and you know closing your eyes and holding your balance. Also, different types of walking or what we would call gait exercises though gait with turning moving your head turning your head, turning in a circle, you know, different obstacle courses, all kinds of things like that.”

There are many benefits with this type of therapy.

“I found that people really get a lot of benefit out of it if they’re experiencing especially vertigo, because it’s such an uncomfortable sensation. You know, your world is spinning. You can’t get, you know, in focus to even walk the street, or you know, get out of bed in the morning. So, a lot of times with benign vertigo, their symptoms can be completely relieved with physical therapy. And the treatments for benign vertigo are 90 percent successful and it does recur, but at least we can give them some education about what to do in the future if it if it were to recur,” said Swartz. “Also, patients who have like just overall general sense of dizziness or off balance, sometimes doing those balance or those walking exercises gets them either stronger or decreases their risk of falling or at least gives them a little bit more confidence so they can be more active and get out and walk and not be afraid to get out in the community.”

To learn more about vestibular rehabilitation therapy, please visit https://www.aspirus.org/therapies.