Would vascular testing trump + vertebral artery test in this case?

(Before It's News)

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I read with interest this Johnson et al 2008 Manual Therapy by Dr. Johnson on a patient responding to manual therapy after having a (modified) positive vertebral artery test.  This article is not open access but feel free to contact me if you would like it @ [email protected]

The Case

The gist is a 24 year old female patient has a 1 year history of dizziness provoked by left cervical rotation and describes it as feeling of anxiety and difficulty communicating.

The clinician’s decision making prompted him to perform the modified vertebral artery test (VAT)—-which was negative to left—-but positive to right for concordant symptoms of dizziness/slow ability to communicate.

Therefore, he referred out for further investigation via duplex ultrasound—which was negative for any significant stenosis in carotids and vertebral arteries.

Considering the negative radiology report—he then proceeded to examine the cervical spine to identify other possible reasons for the symptomology—in this case, finding several tender points bilaterally in the upper trapezius, SCM, levator scapula and anterior scalene muscles.

Only strain-counterstrain techniques were performed—which resulted in a negative finding of modified VAT immediately, after several weeks and again at one year.

Discussion

Overall, I think this is a great case to add to the literature on the limitations (false-positives) of the VAT and I appreciate the authors for taking the time to write it in a respected manual journal.

My big take home from this is :

• from knowing the limitations behind the VAT,
• a one year history of symptomology (it wasn’t stated in article why the patient finally sought care from physio—such as an exacerbation, etc)
• — I wonder if clinical reasoning to refer out for duplex ultrasound due to positive VAT could be trumped by vascular testing (blood pressure, auscultation).

So my question to you is—

If this patient arrived to your clinic with the above symptomology and vascular examination unremarkable, in other words, blood pressure not elevated, negative bruits—-yes, this is a broad statement—

—-would you make the decision to proceed to a manual examination to confirm or refute your hypothesis that the symptomology is arising from a rotational vertebral artery dizziness condition PRIOR to having duplex ultrasound results?

Looking forward to hearing from you!  We can have more discussion in comment section.

Keep learning—Harrison

Filed under: Cervical, Differential Diagnosis, Examination / Evaluation, Spine http://intouchpt.wordpress.com/

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