Spontaneous Jamming of Horizontal Semicircular Canal Combined with Canalolithiasis of Contralateral Posterior Semicircular Canal

Abstract

Spontaneous canalith jam is an uncommon form of benign paroxysmal positional vertigo mimicking acute vestibular neuritis. We described for the first time a spontaneous horizontal semicircular canalith jam associated with a typical canalolithiasis involving contralateral posterior semicircular canal (PSC), illustrating how the latter condition modified direction-fixed nystagmus during head movements. An 81-year-old woman with persistent vertigo referred to our center. Video-Frenzel examination showed horizontal direction-fixed right-beating nystagmus in primary gaze position, inhibited by visual fixation. She exhibited corrective saccades after leftward head impulses. Chin-to-chest positioning at the head-pitch test did not modify spontaneous nystagmus, whereas slight torsional components with the top pole of the eye beating toward the right ear appeared in backward head-bending, resulting in mixed horizontal-torsional nystagmus. At supine positioning tests, direction-fixed nystagmus turned into direction-changing geotropic horizontal nystagmus, which was stronger on the left side, while overlapping upbeat nystagmus with torsional right-beating components appeared on the right. Primary clinical findings were consistent with a left horizontal semicircular canalith jam, inducing a persistent utriculofugal cupular displacement, combined with a typical right-sided PSC-canalolithiasis. Once canalith jam crumbled, resulting in a non-ampullary arm canalolithiasis of the horizontal semicircular canal, both involved canals were freed by debris with appropriate repositioning procedures.