Do You Have a Neurological Problem?
Understanding Brain Death
There is more to a loss of consciousness than simply not being awake. States such as coma, persistent vegetative state, and normal sleep all involve a loss of consciousness, and all have different degrees of severity. Even in cases as severe as persistent vegetative state, there are rare cases of people awakening. Brain death is different. As...
Uncommon Causes of Chronic Dizziness
For many, dizziness doesn't come in spurts, but instead is a constant: something that needs to be managed every minute of every day. Unfortunately, clear causes for this dizziness are the exception rather than the rule. Someone with chronic dizziness and no apparent cause may be diagnosed with chronic subjective dizziness. First, though, other potential causes should be ruled out.
What Causes Seizures?
An allegory to describe what happens in the brain during a seizure.
Symptoms of a Stroke
Stroke is one of the most serious neurological illnesses, but many people never recognize what's happening in time to treat the problem. Learn how to tell if you're having a stroke.
Uncommon Causes of Acute Recurrent Vertigo
If you're suffering from acute attacks of dizziness and the most common problems have been ruled out, there are more places to look. Learn about other causes of dizziness here.
Six Common Causes of Sudden Vertigo
Vertigo is an illusionary sense of movement. When vertigo comes on suddenly, it can be uncomfortable, and sometimes dangerous. Learn more about causes of vertigo here.
Disorders of Consciousness
A person’s level of consciousness is a measure of how alert and oriented they are. Consciousness is a spectrum with many shades. While the best known alteration of consciousness is the infamous coma, meaning someone is unarousable with their eyes closed, there are many other ways that a persons’ consciousness can be impaired. Some may mimic...
When Dizziness is Serious
Dizziness is a common symptom which sometimes indicates a serious problem. How can you tell when your dizziness is serious?
Could You Have Postconcussive Syndrome?
Postconcussive syndrome is a controversial medical diagnosis, but few would dispute that many people suffer from similar symptoms following a head injury. These can include head ache, dizziness, mood changes, and sleep problems.
Numbness and Tingling
How neurologists approach the common problem of numbness and tingling.
Introduction to Psychosomatic Illness
Psychosomatic disorders are frequently misunderstood. The term is used when a psychiatric problem such as depression,anxiety or other disturbance manifests itself as seemingly unrelated physical symptoms. To make a diagnosis of a psychosomatic disorder, there must be no other medical explanation for the symptoms. The symptoms are not faked or under the patient's control, and they can improve with treatment.
Weakness: Finding the Cause
When someone is weak, neurologists try to figure out exactly where the source of weakness lies. All other steps in determining the cause of weakness follow this crucial step.
Do You Need a Neurologist?
Neurology is the medical specialty that focuses on the brain, spinal cord, nerves and muscles. Neurologists deal with a large number of different problems. Do you need a neurologist?
Types of Tremor
When evaluating someone who has a tremor, neurologists attempt to put the tremor into one of several categories. Each category is associated with different disease types, and therefore also associated with different types of treatments. Everyone has some kind of tremor. What sort of tremor do you have?
What's Causing Your Tremor?
All of us have some degree of tremor. So how do we know when a tremor means something more? Learn about what you should know about your tremor in order to determine if it's serious.
Aprosodia
Prosody is how we change the tone of our voice to convey different levels of meaning to the sentences we speak. In some cases, the brain areas controlling this ability can be damaged, resulting in what is often confused for depression or lack of caring, although the patient may actually be otherwise normal.
Psychogenic Nonepileptic Seizures
Conversion disorders occur when a psychiatric stress makes itself known by acting out like a neurological illness. Psychogenic nonepileptic seizures are an example. Although there is no abnormal electrical activity in the brain as is present in epilepsy, these patients act and feel like they are having epileptic seizures. Rather than treating...
By Symptoms
Learn more about whether your symptoms could be due to a problem with the nervous system.
When Back Pain is Serious
Back pain is one of the most common reasons why people come to see a doctor. The vast majority of the time, the problem will either resolve on its own or requires little treatment. Sometimes surgery is required, but even then back pain is rarely an emergency. Other times, though, back pain can signify very serious trouble that may go even...
What is Ataxia?
Ataxia is the medical term for clumsiness. Lack of coordination can be caused by many things, but is usually associated with the cerebellum.
On Delusion
Delusions are strong beliefs that do not hold truth in reality and are negated by evidence to the contrary. Delusions occur in various psychiatric and neurological disorders and manifest in many different flavors.
Vestibular Migraine
Migraine can mimic almost any neurological problem, and among those is dizziness. People with migraine often complain of nausea and a sense of spinning. Learn more here.
Dangerous Causes of Dizziness
What are the potentially life-threatening causes of dizziness?
Is My Dizziness a Side Effect?
It’s no secret that medications used by doctors to treat diseases and alleviate discomfort can, in fact, have side effects that cause a new set of problems. Dizziness is one of the most common side effects associated with medications.