Headache and dizziness - reasons and what to do about it?

Many people complain of pain and dizziness. The reasons for this are different, but ultimately, pain and dizziness greatly complicate a person’s full life and reduce performance.
It is even more unpleasant if you experience headache and dizziness. There are causes of headaches that do not lead to severe consequences and, as a rule, do not cause serious problems. They may appear every day or every few days and may also manifest as weakness. However, they require attention; it would not be superfluous to visit a specialist who will select medications to eliminate headaches.

Sometimes your head hurts and you feel dizzy if you suddenly get out of bed at the alarm. In this case, the body changed position.

The problem very often worries those people who have weak blood vessels (usually teenagers and pensioners).

Ask your question to a neurologist for free Irina Martynova. Graduated from Voronezh State Medical University named after. N.N. Burdenko. Clinical resident and neurologist BUZ VO \"Moscow Polyclinic\".Ask a question>>

Stress

The reason for headaches and dizziness may be stress . In such situations, many hormones are released into the blood. The vessels of the entire body, including the head, narrow, thereby reducing the amount of oxygen reaching the brain. And this causes headaches and slight dizziness. Frequent or severe stress can have a very negative impact on your health.

They can be strong and systematic, appearing without stressful situations.

General recommendations

Any pharmaceutical products can dull the discomfort in the head only for a short period of time. If your head not only hurts every day, but also feels dizzy, both in the evening and during the entire work shift, a person feels nauseous, and the temperature rises, this should be alarming. It is recommended to undergo a modern diagnostic examination in a timely manner - only identifying and eliminating the true root cause of the headache can restore health and well-being.

To cope with headache pain, if it was definitely not caused by any disease, the following recommendations help:

• ensure quality rest at night;
• adjust your diet - absolutely eliminate coffee and alcoholic drinks;
• try to walk more - travel out of town more often, spend time with loved ones at recreation centers, go skiing;
• if you feel nauseous after taking certain medications, stop taking them and report unpleasant symptoms to a specialist;
• adjust work activity and rest - the head may hurt and feel dizzy after intellectual and physical fatigue;
• Low-grade fever and headache can be signs of psycho-emotional overload - conversations with a highly qualified psychotherapist will help you get rid of them.

It is recommended to entrust it to a specialist to find the answer to the question of why there is discomfort in the head every evening - self-diagnosis can only aggravate the situation and provoke negative complications and consequences.



Regular or periodic headaches (cephalalgia) with nausea are a sign of a pathological condition or severe fatigue. Similar symptoms often accompany migraines, concussions, surges in blood pressure, colds, and changes in blood vessels. If you often have a headache and feel nauseous, look for the true cause of the ailment, and do not fight its manifestation.

You need to fight the disease, not its symptoms; frequent pain is a signal to consult a doctor

Common Causes

It can be concluded that the main causes of headaches without serious causes and consequences are:

• poor blood flow due to pressure on blood vessels;
• large doses of hormones in the blood during stressful situations;
• quick change of body position.

But there are also serious reasons why your head hurts and feels dizzy. As a rule, subsequently the headaches for such reasons are much stronger. The reasons seriously threaten a person’s health; if your head hurts or feels dizzy, you should immediately consult a specialist. Under no circumstances should you waste time and self-medicate. Only the doctor knows exactly what to do. For some reasons, there may be a threat not only to health, but also to life. There is no need to independently determine the reason why you feel dizzy and have a headache; this should be done by specialists.

Headaches may be accompanied by weakness, tinnitus, or ringing in the ear.

Migraine

This is a chronic disease of vascular origin that occurs when the blood vessels narrow and subsequently dilate in the head and neck area. We are talking about a widespread disease, manifested by periodic attacks at various intervals (an attack can last up to 3 days). With a migraine, the top of the head, temple, and eye area may hurt, and you may often feel dizzy.

Atherosclerosis

One of the main reasons why you may feel seriously ill and often feel dizzy is atherosclerosis. With this disease, a person suffers from headaches and weakness . The disease is caused by cholesterol plaques deposited in the blood vessels. This significantly reduces the blood supply to certain areas of the brain. Attention and memory decrease. This can lead to sleep disturbances in the future.

Diagnostics

Given the range of possible causes, a general examination is required. The patient is examined by a neurologist, undergoes an ECG and blood pressure measurement. Blood tests for mineral levels, kidney parameters, liver tests, CRP (infectious processes in the body), etc. are also important.

If diseases of the brain, vestibular and motor systems are suspected, a CT examination is usually performed. It is also advisable to perform an ultrasound of the heart muscle.

In the absence of a clear cause or the presence of visual impairment, an ophthalmological examination is recommended. Further testing is prescribed in accordance with the results of the above studies.

Cervical osteochondrosis

When the disease occurs, cervical osteochondrosis changes the location and structure of the intervertebral discs, as well as the vertebrae. With these changes, the blood vessels are experienced. The brain receives insufficient blood and nutrients along with it. This is why pain and dizziness appear. The headache may begin in the morning and continue throughout the day. Characterized by periodicity. The cause of pain can be a very hard or soft pillow. A person gets tired much faster, drowsiness appears, and the upper limbs go numb.

If you turn your head suddenly, you may feel dizzy.

Treatment methods

People try to eliminate constant headaches and dizziness by taking medications, proper nutrition and special exercises.

A neurologist determines which drug is effective in these cases. Severe cases may require surgery.

Systemic dizziness, accompanied by pain and other unpleasant symptoms, is treated depending on the manifestations. They are trying to improve the condition of the body with the help of vestibulolytics, antihistamines, tranquilizers, and betahistine chloride.

Such treatment allows you to normalize the functioning of the vestibular apparatus.

Hypotension

Low blood pressure, which is the opposite of hypertension, also causes headaches. Older people are more prone to the disease. With hypotension, there is a feeling of weakness, the skin of the face is pale, nausea, and there may be gag reflexes. If you suddenly get up from a chair, you may feel dizzy.

The tone of organs and body parts is impaired with vegetative-vascular dystonia. The same applies to the vascular system of the brain.

Children and adolescents are most often at risk.

Headache due to bad habits

If you smoke or drink alcoholic beverages, this not only has a destructive effect on the body, but also has a bad effect on the blood vessels of the brain . If people who smoke abstain from this destructive habit for a long period, it leads to headaches and also reduces the thinking process. If you drink alcohol in large quantities, the next day a hangover appears and the brain is poisoned by alcohol. This can cause swelling of the brain. Therefore, you should not be surprised if dizziness and pain appear.

One common cause of serious headaches can be problems with the inner ear. Causes of problems with the inner ear can be:

• the appearance of infections;
• injuries;
• inflammatory processes.

What to do if you have a headache and nausea

If headaches and nausea occur from time to time, you should visit a physician. He will conduct an initial examination and refer you to a specialized specialist. The doctor will collect anamnesis, prescribe tests and diagnostic studies, make a diagnosis and select treatment.

Informative methods for diagnosing headaches:

• general tests that will help exclude diseases of internal organs, the impact of infection or inflammation on the body;
• X-ray of the spine - cervical spine;
• MRI or CT scan of the brain.

If you suddenly have a severe headache, it is better not to delay getting medical help and call an ambulance. Before her arrival, you need to measure your blood pressure and temperature. If you have hypertension, you should take medicine to lower your blood pressure. For hypotension, strong black tea with lemon and sugar can help.

The principles of treatment for headaches with nausea depend on the causes of the symptom:

• massage and exercise therapy are effective for vascular problems, osteochondrosis of the cervical spine;
• surgical therapy – may be necessary if tumors are detected in the brain, and conservative treatment of a number of pathologies fails;
• medications - their action is aimed at restoring the functionality of blood vessels, removing cholesterol deposits from them, and fighting infectious pathogens. For a number of diseases, you simply have to wait out attacks with the help of analgesics or NSAIDs. Sometimes antidepressants have a good effect;
• traditional medicine - designed to reduce the severity of unpleasant sensations. A decoction of elderberries, St. John's wort or oregano can relieve a combination of symptoms. Mint tea relieves headaches and nausea, but it is not recommended to take it for more than one week.

In most cases, to treat headaches and nausea, it is enough to adjust your daily routine, give up smoking and alcohol, and introduce sports into your schedule or at least simple gymnastics at the workplace. Do not overuse medications unless advised by your doctor. Such experiments can become a source of abusive pain, which is extremely difficult to get rid of.

How to treat?

Under no circumstances should headaches be ignored , especially if they last for several days or appear periodically. You need to go to an appointment with a therapist or neurologist. These specialists will be able to understand the reasons and, if necessary, will refer you to doctors of a different profile, depending on the cause of the pain. There the patient will undergo further examination and receive the appropriate course of treatment.

As a rule, for a headache, a person may be prescribed the following types of diagnostics:

• tomography;
• you need to donate blood for a general analysis;
• rheoencephalography;
• angiography

Further treatment will depend on what caused the pain.

Some medications will only help temporarily relieve painful spasms and alleviate suffering, but this will not lead to recovery. To temporarily eliminate or reduce pain, you can take Citramon, Pentalgin or No-Shpu. But it is better to take these drugs when you consult with specialists.

I feel dizzy in the evening

A common cause of dizziness in the evening is a disease of the vestibular apparatus. It is located in the middle ear. Dizziness feels very sharp, as if you are being spun or the space around you is moving.

Accompanied by symptoms such as:

• feeling of nausea;

less frequent vomiting;

• cold sweat.

With otitis media, and everything related to diseases of the ENT organs, the accompaniment of such dizziness is not a rare occurrence. There is no need to focus on the fact that you feel dizzy only in the evening or only in the morning. The main thing is to find the reason for this.

If the dizziness is mild, but intensifies when you move your head (for example, you decide to stretch your neck), then most likely it is osteochondrosis of your cervical spine. More often the balance is disturbed, the feeling of pushes on the sides. Symptoms of this disease include a feeling of pain in the neck and back of the head.

If you lose consciousness due to acute dizziness, and you feel weak, you have decreased sensitivity, then you urgently need to seek help from a specialist. All these signs can be caused by a cerebral circulatory disorder, that is, a stroke.

Pre-syncope is also often referred to as dizziness. You feel sick, an approaching feeling of loss of consciousness, your head seems to become light, your face turns pale and your heartbeat increases, your eyes darken, a feeling of fear appears, sweating increases - all these reasons can be caused by heart disease.

Very often in the evening you feel dizzy due to overwork, when a person is depressed, in a state of prolonged anxiety - this is psychogenic dizziness. This is not like all those sensations described earlier. You feel like you're in a fog, your head becomes heavy, you feel like you're drunk, you feel lightheaded. This condition may not go away for a month, but generally lasts a couple of weeks.

Anyone who has experienced this knows how excruciating the pain is. The pain shoots through almost the entire head. Sometimes there is a feeling of coldness in the diseased nerve, numbness around it. This shooting pain in the head is often accompanied by other symptoms: lacrimation and photophobia.

This is one of the most common pains in the world. And it does not depend at all on the amount drunk. Some people have no pain even after several liters of beer, while for others even one can can cause terrible pain. It is also a matter of surrounding factors, after all, for one person.

Migraine without aura and headache are very similar; people who may actually suffer from pain due to migraine do not even know that they have it. The aura affects not only vision, but can also affect speech.

At the moment, the most common complaint from patients during consultation with a specialist is that they have a headache, especially in the evening, they may feel a little dizzy, and their temperature rises to subfebrile levels.

Against the background of the above symptoms, the person feels nauseous, and their health noticeably worsens. If this condition recurs every evening, it is not recommended to delay consultation with a neurologist. To find out the root cause why you often feel dizzy, have pain in the back of your head, and everything blurs before your eyes, you will need to conduct a diagnostic examination.

Prevention

Everyone knows that it is much better to prevent a disease than to take expensive treatment later. The same applies to headaches.

In order to prevent severe headaches, you need to follow the correct daily routine.

1. You need to go to bed no later than 22.30. Wake up should be at 6.00.
2. If you work a lot at the computer, take short breaks after 45 minutes of work. During breaks, stand up and walk around a bit. It’s even better if you perform a set of gymnastic exercises.
3. Arrange regular walks in the air; the room where you spend a lot of time should be well ventilated. It is known that in stuffy rooms, the head begins to hurt more often than in ventilated ones.
4. Don't ignore relaxation sessions, you can meditate. They have a beneficial effect on the psyche.
5. Massage or self-massage of the collar area will help a lot in eliminating or preventing headaches if the cause of the pain is osteochondrosis.

There are a large number of reasons why your head starts to hurt or feel dizzy.

But even with the most serious ones, if you contact a specialist in time, you can get rid of the problem . But for this you need to completely follow the doctor’s recommendations. Only this way, after some time, you will feel significant relief, and even complete relief.

It happens that no causes of headache or dizziness are noticed, but these negative phenomena, which interfere with a full life and work, are present. What is the reason for this? Depending on the situation, you may feel sick or dizzy. The reasons for this may be fatigue, exhaustion of the body, large doses of adrenaline release due to stressful situations, prolonged stay in hot conditions, bad weather, magnetic storms, poisoning of the body.

If headaches or dizziness bother you quite often, the cause may be due to health problems.

If there is even the slightest suspicion of health problems, you should immediately contact a specialist, otherwise the consequences will be very serious.

Characteristics of pain in the head area

Experts know for certain that the basis for the occurrence of pain in the head is a powerful irritation of many proprioceptors - in the membranes of the brain, intracranial nerves, vascular structures, and muscle fibers of the skull.

During the consultation, the specialist will definitely ask the patient what the main parameters of the headache are: when it first appeared, its duration, the frequency of exacerbations in recent months, accompanying symptoms. It is recommended to think through the scope of this information in advance - it will significantly facilitate the formulation of an adequate diagnosis.

Main characteristics of pain and possible causes of its occurrence:

1. If the head begins to hurt and at the same time the temperature rises, there are chills, body aches - it is quite possible that the person has a respiratory infection, for example, an acute respiratory infection, the flu.
2. If headaches are observed every evening or in the early morning hours, combined with blurred vision, photophobia, a person feels nauseous, or has the urge to vomit, it is quite possible that intracranial pressure parameters may increase; a neurological examination is urgently needed.
3. Repeated headaches in the evening, starting from the neck area, wrapping around the entire skull, like a hoop, with pressure on the eyes - may indicate overexertion: such pains are especially typical for office workers who are forced to remain in one position throughout the working day, for example, at the computer screen.
4. Throbbing headaches that occur not only in the evening, but throughout the day, localized in one point of the head, accompanied by the appearance of visual, auditory, and olfactory hallucinations indicate the migraine nature of their occurrence.
5. Not only the head itself can hurt, but also other organs located inside the skull, for example, the cochlea of ​​the inner ear, disturbed by injury, infectious or bacterial agents, or intracranial nerves damaged for a number of reasons, for example, the trigeminal or glossopharyngeal - make an appropriate diagnosis Only a highly qualified specialist can do it.

The specialist will judge why the unpleasant sensations developed based on the results of the diagnostic examinations performed. Self-diagnosis and further self-medication are absolutely prohibited.

When should you contact a specialist?

It is enough to simply distinguish a simple headache, which is not caused by health problems from diseases. Seriousness is indicated by the presence of the following syndromes:

• feeling of nausea;
• a gag reflex appeared;
• feel dizzy;
• a person may faint;
• ringing or noise in the ears;
• nervous tic;
• hallucinations;
• vision decreases;
• body temperature rises.

If you or your loved ones experience one or more of these symptoms, you should immediately contact an experienced and qualified doctor.

It’s better not to take risks; the sooner you contact, the easier it will be to cure the disease. Be sure to watch the video on this topic

During pregnancy

Headache is one of the first, but not very common, signs of pregnancy caused by hormonal changes in the body and an increase in blood volume. Pain and dizziness are more common during pregnancy than at other times. Cephalgia is caused by various reasons. In later stages of pregnancy, especially at the end of the 3rd trimester, it can be a sign of preeclampsia.

During pregnancy, it is recommended to avoid medications unless their use is necessary. To alleviate the condition (in severe cases, after consulting a doctor), you can use paracetamol-based drugs (Paracetamol, Panadol, Paralen).

Important! During pregnancy, it is prohibited to take Acetylsalicylic acid (Aspirin) or Ibuprofen (Ibalgin, Ibuprofen, Nurofen).

Briefly

1. The problem of dizziness and headaches is especially acute in people with weak blood vessels.
2. The causes of symptoms may be: stress, eye fatigue, atherosclerosis, head injuries and tumors, migraine, cervical osteochondrosis, hypertension and hypotension, bad habits.
3. Ignoring pain is highly discouraged; consultation with a therapist or neurologist is necessary.
4. Diagnostics includes: tomography, general blood test, rheoencephalography and angiography.
5. Treatment can only be prescribed by a doctor and will be determined by the cause of the symptoms.
6. To relieve headaches and dizziness before visiting a doctor: citramon, pentalgin or No-Shpa.
7. Prevention methods: proper daily routine, breaks when working at a PC, walks in the fresh air and ventilation of the room, massage and relaxation sessions.

What to do if you have a headache and nausea

Medications eliminate the cause of discomfort and alleviate the patient’s condition. To enhance the therapeutic effect of pharmaceutical products, folk recipes are used.

Treatment with drugs

Medicines are selected based on the disease that caused the headache with nausea. Complex therapy includes several groups of drugs:

• anti-inflammatory non-steroidal drugs - Ibuprofen, Diclofenac, Aspirin, Ketoprofen, Indomethacin;
• painkillers - Piretin, Analgin, Spazdolzin, Optalgin, Citramon;
• antispasmodic substances - Papaverine, Halidor, No-shpa, Buscopan;
• anti-migraine drugs – Sumatriptan, Dihydrergot, Ditamine, Almotriptan;
• antibiotics – Ampicillin, Amoxiclav;
• sedatives - Novo-passit, Fitosed, Dormiplant, Corvalol.

Aspirin is the most famous remedy for headaches and can be taken without a doctor's recommendation.

Folk remedies

Herbal decoctions, infusions, compresses, lotions are an excellent addition to the main treatment.

Herbal decoction

A decoction of linden inflorescences will help eliminate headaches

1 tbsp. l. combine anise fruits, lingonberry and coltsfoot leaves, add 2 tbsp. l. raspberry berries and linden inflorescences. Pour boiling water over the finished mixture (30 g of collection per 500 ml of boiling water), simmer over low heat for 10 minutes. Drink the decoction hot - 1 cup in the morning and evening before bed.

Calming herbal tea

Mix valerian root, hawthorn berries, motherwort and bearberry herbs in equal quantities (2 tbsp each). Pour 3 tbsp into 1 liter of boiling water. l. prepared raw materials and simmer over low heat for 5 minutes. Take 200 ml of the decoction warm one hour before meals three times a day.

A soothing decoction of valerian root will give you a break from headaches

Potato and milk compresses

Peel and finely grate 10 medium potatoes, add ¼ cup milk, stir. Place the prepared mixture on gauze laid out in one layer. Place the compress on the forehead and wrap it with a towel, hold for 1–1.5 hours. The procedure is best done before bedtime for 5–7 days.

Saline solution with ammonia and camphor

Dilute 2 tsp in 500 ml of warm water. salt. Combine 50 ml of ammonia and 5 ml of camphor oil, pour into the saline solution, stir until smooth. The product is used before going to bed - moisten the forehead, temples, and the back of the head generously, wrap the head tightly with a woolen scarf and leave until the morning. The recipe helps you wake up in the morning without nausea and cephalalgia.

Nettle infusion

Nettle has properties that can relieve headaches

Brew 3 tbsp in 500 ml of boiling water. l. dried and crushed nettles, wrap until cool. Drink the strained infusion 100 ml every 2 hours. The course of treatment is 10–15 days.

Migraine remedy

Beat a fresh chicken egg into an empty glass and pour hot milk to the brim, stir immediately and drink. It is enough to drink 1 cocktail per day to get relief. The course of therapy is up to 5 days.

Cabbage compresses

Wash large cabbage leaves and wipe dry. Place on the forehead, grabbing the temples, place on the back of the head, secure with a scarf. Duration of 1 procedure is 20-40 minutes. Cabbage leaves are replaced with burdock, the recipe and effect are similar.