Management Protocol for the Unilateral Posterior Canal - Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo - A Prospective...

The objectives of our study were to assess the effectiveness of the single Epley manoeuvre per session for three consecutive days and to determine the protocol for treating posterior canal-Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo (pc-BPPV). At our tertiary care centre, 410 patients with a confirmed diagnosis of unilateral pc-BPPV were included in a prospective observational study. For all the participants, the Epley manoeuvre was performed once daily for three consecutive days. Patients with persistent vertigo underwent Semont's liberatory manoeuvre and were reassessed after one week. The above protocol was repeated for patients who continued to have symptoms. The majority (40.0%) of patients were seen in the 6th decade, followed by the 5th decade (34.4%). Among the study participants, the mean age was 51.57 ± 9.916 years. The male-to-female ratio is 1:1.05. The right ear was affected by 51.75%, and the left by 48.3%. With this protocol, 392 (95.6%) patients were relieved of symptoms by day 3. A six-month recovery rate of 99.75% was achieved. In our study, 99.8% of patients with unilateral pc-BPPV were cured, and 6.34% had a recurrence of symptoms within six months of follow-up. Hence, combining the Epley and the Semont manoeuvres and repeating the manoeuvres on consecutive days has better improvement.