In this YouTube video, Bill from Beyond Fitness Online explains why he emphasizes the vestibular system when treating clients with vertigo or chronic pain. He describes the vestibular apparatus behind the ear as the brain’s gravity and motion sensor, detailing how its signals travel to four brain nuclei and interact closely with the cerebellum to stabilize the spine, coordinate movement, and inhibit pain. Bill illustrates the concept with practical examples—such as retro‑walking (walking backwards while focusing on a visual target) to stimulate vestibular input and reduce knee pain, and mentions similar links for shoulder, neck, and jaw discomfort. He argues that many people with musculoskeletal pain likely have an underlying vestibular issue, even if they have never experienced vertigo. The video concludes by directing viewers to other channel videos that demonstrate vestibular exercises (VOR drills, saccade and smooth‑pursuit eye movements, walking and bouncing drills) and invites questions in the comments.
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Hi, I'm Bill from Beyond Fitness Online. One of the things that often comes up and I'm asked a lot is, why do I focus so much on the vestibular system? The people that I generally work with are either vertigo and vestibular symptoms, or they have a lot of pain and we're trying to get over the pain. And what I explain to people is how there's a lot of crossover between those 2 things. So when it comes to how your body processes pain, or more specifically how your brain processes pain, is there's a lot of different things that go into that. And one of the most commonly overlooked things is how the vestibular system plays a role in that. So the vestibular system basically, if you're not familiar, is an apparatus that you have behind the bones in each ear that tell your brain which way gravity is pulling you and how you're moving in relation to that gravity. It then sends a signal to 4 different nuclei in the brain, and it does all kinds of different things, including stabilizing your spine and helping you balance and all kinds of other things. It works very closely with a part of your brain called the cerebellum, which is in charge of not just balance, but also coordination and things like that. So there's this whole loop, and a lot of that actually plays a role in inhibiting pain. So that's why we kind of do both. So just as an example, if you've ever injured your knee and had physical therapy, most likely they had you do what's called retro walking or walking backwards. So that's just an example of not just how to use your knee differently, but also a way to stimulate your vestibular system if you're using a visual target. So then you get better pain inhibition into that knee. There's all kinds of stuff with the shoulder, the shoulder and the neck and the jaw. And the cerebellum are all very closely connected. Anything in the neck and the spine will be impacted by the vestibular system because the vestibular system sends a signal to the brain. The brain then says, gravity's pulling me this way, I don't want to fall over. It stabilizes the spine in a specific way. So we always want to look at the vestibular system when we're dealing with any kind of issue. So if you're somebody who's had vertigo in the past and you're like, oh, I had a back pain, or I had knee pain, or any other kind of pain, you didn't think they were related, Odds are that they probably were. And if you do have pain but you've never had vertigo, you probably do have a small underlying vestibular issue. So we want to look at those things. So that is the approach that I take in those situations. And if you want some actionable items, there's other videos on my channel with all kinds of different vestibular exercises like VORs like this in each direction. We got eye exercises for saccades and smooth pursuits. And then we've got all kinds of different walking and bouncing and things like that. So check those out on my channel, and if you have any questions, leave them in the comments below. And until next time, live healthy.
