The number of people who present to emergency departments with dizziness is increasing, as is the percentage of emergency department visits resulting from dizziness, according to research presented at the 2013 Annual Meeting of the American Neurological Association. Benign positional vertigo is one of the major causes of dizziness, yet clinicians are administering a proven cure, the Epley maneuver, less often, said Kevin Kerber, MD.
At the same time, an increasing proportion of patients who present with dizziness are receiving CAT scans, which may have little value in this context and may entail more harm than benefit for these patients, in terms of radiation exposure, cost, length of stay in the emergency department, and misdiagnoses, said Dr. Kerber, Associate Professor of Neurology at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. The system used to document emergency department visits may be contributing to the high rate of CAT scans, he added.