Abstract

The influence of the vestibular system on autonomic responses is well known, as seeing that the autonomic symptoms such as pallor, nausea, and sweating are commonly observed during acute vestibular vertigo attacks. Thinking about the convergence of autonomic and vestibular afferents to the solitary nucleus and being integrated in reticular formation, it is taken to be granted that autonomic and vestibular systems are interacted each other. In this respect, several studies using the tests for the demonstration of the abnormalities in the autonomic nervous system have demonstrated the autonomic dysfunction in the wide range of vestibular disorders. The fluctuation of the blood pressure and the heart rate by head-up tilt test (HUTT) to show the cardiovascular challenges have been widely studied and showed significant results. At the same time, it has also been proposed that autonomic dysfunction can be the etiological background in some portion of the dizziness and vertigo. It is uncertain whether the autonomic dysfunction can directly cause the vertigo or the autonomic symptoms are simply caused by vestibular vertigo. However, by using the well-known, non-invasive, and simple autonomic tests, causative relationship of these two systems can be more validated. In this paper, methods for the autonomic function tests and the reported evidence demonstrating the relationship between autonomic derangement and vestibular disorders are reviewed.