BENIGN PAROXYSMAL POSITIONAL VERTIGO IN OLDER WOMEN MAY BE RELATED TO OSTEOPOROSIS AND OSTEOPENIA

Benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPY), so-called canalolithiasis andcupulolithiasis, usually occursafterheadtrauma or viral vestibular neuritis. In many cases, the causeremains obscure, and it oftenaffects women more than 50 yearsold.The goalof thiswork wasto study a possible relationship between BPPY andosteopenia or osteoporosis. Thirty-two women, whose agesranged from 50 to 85 years (median age, 69 years), who had BPPYand were free of any other otoneurologic history, were selected. The diagnosis ofosteopenia or osteoporosis wasconfirmed by a bonemineral density measurement madewithdualx-ray absorptiometry of spine and hip (T-score). The BPPY was unilateral in 26 patients and bilateral in 6 patients. Our results showed osteopenia or osteoporosis in 24 of the 32 patients (75%)withBPPY. TheT-scores werecompared in 3 age groups to thoseof 83 healthy women. The patients with BPPY had a significantly lower (p <.026) T-score in all groups. Possible pathophysiological mechanisms are discussed to explainthe apparent correlation between BPPY and osteopenia or osteoporosis. KEY WORDS- benign paroxysmal positional vertigo, calcium metabolism, canalolithiasis, cupulolithiasis, osteopenia, os-teoporosis, otolith, woman