![]() Valve problems can restrict blood flow and may cause lightheadedness or dizziness, especially during exercise, she says.Ĭertain meds, like painkillers and some anti-anxiety pills, can produce dizziness or lightheadedness. Burroughs Peña says, whereas people 60 and up are at a higher risk of an arrhythmia. These congenital issues are likely to occur in younger people, Dr. However, some people develop problems with their heart valves at birth, meaning their hearts have to work harder to function properly. Your heart relies on four valves to evenly distribute blood throughout your entire body. That kind of experience immediately makes emergency docs think of abnormal heart rhythms, which are the most common cause of sudden cardiac death, according to the Mayo Clinic. ![]() “Someone might be in the middle of talking and all of a sudden pass out and wake up on the floor without remembering feeling anything beforehand,” she explains. Burroughs Peña, M.D., assistant professor of clinical medicine in the division of cardiology at the University of California, San Francisco. ![]() ![]() This kind of sudden fainting, often without any warning, is most concerning, says Melissa S. An irregular heartbeat, called an arrhythmia, means your heart beats either too slow or too fast, which can in turn affect the blood supply that reaches your brain, Dr. Play icon The triangle icon that indicates to playĬompared to the relatively slow onset of symptoms caused by “Surprise!”-related fainting, heart-related fainting comes on fast, so you might not even notice any lightheadedness. It’s usually no big deal, but if it happens a lot or if it gets worse instead of better after a few minutes have passed, it’s worth bringing up with your doctor. Usually, you do get a little bit of a warning if you’re really going to faint: You might turn a little green and feel nauseated, he says.įeeling lightheaded or even seeing black spots in your vision when you hop up quickly from a seated position actually has a name: orthostatic hypotension, which describes a sudden drop in blood pressure upon standing. Your nervous system essentially goes into overdrive in these scenarios, Thiruganasambandamoorthy says, and your blood pressure drops suddenly, leading to lightheadedness. When you feel lightheaded because of dehydration-which includes symptoms like dry mouth and skin, dark-colored urine, and headaches-lying down resupplies the heart and the brain with blood, helping you to feel better pretty quickly, he says.Ī similar reaction can be triggered when your college roommate jumps out from behind the couch at your surprise birthday party. “Heat triggers a pathway in the nervous system that causes blood pressure to drop.” “It’s common in a hot room, like standing in church in the summer,” Thiruganasambandamoorthy says. Some people are simply predisposed to feeling lightheaded or even fainting when they get hot and sweaty and lose too much fluid. No matter what, always play it safe by seeking medical attention for any new symptoms, or ones that don’t resolve themselves. Here, 10 potential reasons you could feel lightheaded and why it happens. Still, it’s understandable to want to find answers, especially if this has become a regular thing for you. It’s tricky to know when fainting or lightheadedness is a cause for concern-even doctors often feel stumped. ( Dizziness, on the other hand, can include lightheadedness, but it also comes with the feeling that the room is spinning around you.) Some of these reasons are common and not worrisome, but others need more evaluation.”Įven if you don’t faint from it, that drop in blood pressure or heart rate can cause lightheadedness, that very specific yet hard to describe feeling that you might pass out. “We try to find out why the blood pressure or heart rate would go down. “The cause can stem from many different parts of the body, including a person’s blood pressure going down, heart rate going down, and from neurologic reasons independent of the heart,” he says. As for the rest, an underlying health condition could be to blame, and that could mean potentially serious health concerns down the road.įainting, no matter why it happens, is the result of a short period of time when the brain’s blood supply is decreased, explains Lawrence Phillips, M.D., an assistant professor of medicine in the cardiology division at New York University Langone Medical Center. Know this: The majority of people who have passed out are absolutely fine, says Venkatesh Thiruganasambandamoorthy, M.B.B.S., clinical epidemiologist at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute and an assistant professor at the University of Ottawa. Feeling faint is scary and can make you scramble to figure out why you feel lightheaded.
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