What Causes Cold And Dizziness In An Athletic?

Posted on Fri, 22 Sep 2017

Medically reviewed by Ask A Doctor - 24x7 Medical Review Team

Thu, 21 Sep 2017 Answered on

Fri, 13 Oct 2017 Last reviewed on

Question : Hi. I am healthy, athletic 60 y/o female. Three nights ago, I woke up needing to urinate. When I got up and walked into bathroom, I fainted, passed out cold. Woke up rather quickly because my forehead was hurting due to hitting wood floor. My husband came to my side, helped me sit up and then stand to get to toilet (still had to go!). As I was doing just that, I fainted again. Hit the wall and tile floor. My husband pulled me to lay down by tub, where I remained several hours because I felt nauseous and didn't think I could stand without fainting again. Eventually, I was able to get back in bed and sleep. Felt terrible he next day,but no more problems with dizziness or fainting. Was able to go back to regular routine the next day. What could have caused that? I had a few glasses of wine at dinner but I do this occasionally with no repercussions.

Answered by Dr. Ilir Sharka (-4 hours later)

Brief Answer:
My answer as follows:

Detailed Answer:
Hello!

Welcome and thank you for asking on HCM!

I passed carefully through your question and would explain that your symptoms could be related to vaso-vagal syncope or low blood pressure.

Alcohol intake can also trigger this clinical situation.

Anyway, nothing serious seems to be going on!

If the problem persists, I would recommend consulting with your attending physician for a careful physical exam and some tests:

- a Head Up Tilt test to investigate for possible orthostatic intolerance
- complete blood count for anemia
- blood electrolytes for possible imbalance.

A close monitoring of your blood pressure is necessary too.

Hope you will find this answer helpful!

Best wishes,

Dr. Iliri

Above answer was peer-reviewed by : Dr. Chakravarthy Mazumdar