Handheld Massage Guns Can Cause Vertigo

Abstract

A report of several individuals experiencing sudden episodes of vertigo, or room-spinning dizziness, after use of a handheld massage gun, was published in the May 2024 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, Otolaryngology. The authors report on two patients who developed isolated sudden dizziness within hours of using a handheld massage gun to the upper neck/lower scalp area. The type of vertigo described, called benign paroxysmal positional vertigo, or BPPV, is a specific entity associated with room-spinning dizziness triggered by head movement in a particular direction and orientation in space.