nystagmus and relationship to balance

  What is the relationship between what the eye sees and how it affects
  one's sense of balance?
  The neuro determined recently that I have symptoms of nystagmus in my
  left eye. For many months following what appears to have been a first
  MS exacerbation, my left ear has had this weird feeling of fullness or
  pressure -- it's kind of like I have my finger stuck in my ear or something
   -- and it affects my sense of balance slightly. The feelings in my ear get
   worse if my eyes are tired, or if I'm driving at night and there are lots
  of tail-lights, and I can get a mild feeling of motion sickness if I drive
  for very long. I looked up nystagmus on one of the search engines on the
  Internet, and one reference referred to the vestibular-ocular reflex.
  Sounds darned important, but I can't make heads or tails of the
  explanations.
  I understand that nystagmus is a jerky movement of the eye and that it is
  a relatively common finding in MS. I also see that it indicates that
  either the brain isn't managing well the way the eye functions or the
  brain is getting a garbled message from the eye, but how does the eye
  problem fit with the balance thing and the ear? I've had MRIs of the brain
  and cervical spine with no abnormalities seen, but I continue to have killer
  migraines, balance problems and my normal walk is rapidly becoming more
  of a wide-stepped waddle. I'm not diagnosed with MS or anything else for
  that matter.
  How do I manage this situation, or does it manage me in the end?
  Your comments are appreciated.
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Hello Susan.
A person's sense of "balance" is derived from three different sources of neurological information that all feed into the brain. The first is from so-called unconscious proprioceptive fibers. These are nerve fibers that tell  the balance and equilibrium control center of your brain, known as the cerebellum, where your arms, legs, and other body parts are. It in turn uses this information to help coordinate muscles properly when you decide to perform any action you desire. You are never consciously aware of this whole part of the act, however, if these nerve fibers are damaged, you get a feeling of drunkenness or unsteadiness. The second big source of information is called conscious proprioception. These are nerve fibers that let you be aware of where your arms and legs are in space, even if your eyes are closed or you're in a dark room. When they are damaged, the biggest symptom is stumbling around when you are in a dark room, and also an inability to sense the contour of the ground, like cracks or pebbles on a sidewalk for instance. The third big source of information that feeds into your overall sense of balance is visual input. Even if you can't sense where your arm or leg is, you could still get it to do what you want by looking at it and directing it to the right place. If any two of these three big sources of balance control are damaged, you will usually get significant symptoms like unsteadiness and falling. Nystagmus is when your eyes make a sudden jerking movement. The normal function of nystagmus id to allow your eyes to refix your gaxe when you are tracking a moving object and it gets outside of the range of your eyes ability to move, like when you're riding a spinning amusement park ride and staring at a tree as you are spinning, and then all the sudden you are staring at something else once you spin far enough past the tree that it gets out of your visual range. This specific type of nystagmus is called "rotatory nystagmus". If there is an imbalance in your inner ear nerves, or damage to the cerebellum, you can get abnormal activation of nystagmus, and often this is accompanied by a spinning or motion sickness sensation known as vertigo, since your brain connects nystagmus automatically to movement in such a case. There are alot of other varieties of nystagmus also that mean different things, but what I've explained to you covers 90% of what's relevant. Please remember that information we provide on th eforum is intended for general medical informational purposes, and that the actual diagnosis or treatment of your specific medical condition should be strictly in conjunction with your treating physician(s). If you would be interested in a formal evaluation of your case by a Cleveland Clinic staff neurologist, the appointment number is 1-800-223-2273, extension 45559. We hope you find the information useful.