What is MdDS?

MdDS is a central vestibular (neurological) disorder. It is not a peripheral vestibular (inner ear) disorder or a disease. Parts of the brain associated with MdDS are discussed in the research article, Metabolic and Functional Connectivity Changes in Mal de Debarquement Syndrome, author Yoon-Hee Cha, MD, et al.

What does MdDS stand for?

MdDS is the acronym for Mal de Débarquement Syndrome, which is French and translates to sickness upon disembarking (leaving a boat or other vehicle). The disorder is also known as Disembarkment Syndrome in English. Other names include Persistent Mal de Debarquement (PMdD), Rocking Dizziness, Rocking Vertigo, disembarkation syndrome, and debarquement syndrome.

Erasmus Darwin (grandfather to Charles Darwin) included a description of MdDS under the “Vertigo” section of his medical tome Zoonomia in 1796. However, it wasn’t until almost 200 years later that the disorder was officially named by neurologist Dr. Jeffrey J. Brown. The first research article in modern biomedical literature, “Persistent mal de debarquement syndrome: a motion-induced subjective disorder of balance” by Brown and Baloh, was published in 1987.

Can the name be changed?

While newer research acknowledges that MdDS is not only motion-induced—and that many patients suffer with no associated motion event—the name of the disorder is established in clinical and research settings.