Suppression

There is a considerable ability of people to voluntarily suppress vestibular responses. While one attempts to prevent this by "tasking" patients, it is not always effective. The following three traces show suppression of rotatory chair and caloric responses. VEMP's cannot be suppressed.

Typical appearence of rotatory chair suppression.

Greatly reduced responses, more likely than not due to suppression.

Excellent VEMP responses. VEMPs cannot be suppressed.