Over-the-counter and prescription medications are readily available, such as dimenhydrinate, scopolamine, meclizine, promethazine, cyclizine, and cinnarizine. Cinnarizine is not available in the United States, as it is not approved by the FDA. As these medications often have side effects, anyone involved in high-risk activities while at sea (such as SCUBA divers) must evaluate the risks versus the benefits. Promethazine is especially known to cause drowsiness, which is often counteracted by ephedrine in a combination known as "the Coast Guard cocktail.". There are special considerations to be aware of when the common anti-motion sickness medications are used in the military setting where performance must be maintained at a high level.

Scopolamine is effective and is sometimes used in the form of transdermal patches (1.5 mg) or as a newer tablet form (0.4 mg). The selection of a transdermal patch or scopolamine tablet is determined by a doctor after consideration of the patient's age, weight, and length of treatment time required.

Many pharmacological treatments which are effective for nausea and vomiting in some medical conditions may not be effective for motion sickness. For example, metoclopramide and prochlorperazine, although widely used for nausea, are ineffective for motion-sickness prevention and treatment. This is due to the physiology of the CNS vomiting centre and its inputs from the chemoreceptor trigger zone versus the inner ear. Sedating anti-histamine medications such as promethazine work quite well for motion sickness, although they can cause significant drowsiness.

Ginger root is commonly thought to be an effective anti-emetic, but it is ineffective in treating motion sickness.

As astronauts frequently have motion sickness, NASA has done extensive research on the causes and treatments for motion sickness. One very promising looking treatment is for the person suffering from motion sickness to wear LCD shutter glasses that create a stroboscopic vision of 4 Hz with a dwell of 10 milliseconds.

The Simulator Sickness Questionnaire (SSQ) is currently the standard for measuring simulator sickness. The SSQ was developed based upon 1,119 pairs of pre-exposure/post-exposure scores from data that were collected and reported earlier. These data were collected from 10 Navy flight simulators representing both fixed-wing and rotary-wing aircraft. The simulators selected were both 6-DOF motion and fixed-base models, and also represented a variety of visual display technologies. The SSQ was developed and validated with data from pilots who reported to simulator training healthy and fit.

The SSQ is a self-report symptom checklist. It includes 16 symptoms that are associated with simulator sickness. Participants indicate the level of severity of the 16 symptoms that they are experiencing currently. For each of the 16 symptoms there are four levels of severity (none, slight, moderate, severe). The SSQ provides a Total Severity score as well as scores for three subscales (Nausea, Oculomotor, and Disorientation). The Total Severity score is a composite created from the three subscales. It is the best single measure because it provides an index of the overall symptoms. The three subscales provide diagnostic information about particular symptom categories:

- Nausea subscale is made up of symptoms such as increased salivation, sweating, nausea, stomach awareness, and burping.

- Oculomotor subscale includes symptoms such as fatigue, headache, eyestrain, and difficulty focusing.

- Disorientation subscale is composed of symptoms such as vertigo, dizzy (eyes open), dizzy (eyes closed), and blurred vision.

The three subscales are not orthogonal to one another. There is a general factor common to all of them. Nonetheless, the subscales provide differential information about participants' experience of symptoms and are useful for determining the particular pattern of discomfort produced by a given simulator. All scores have as their lowest level a natural zero (no symptoms) and increase with increasing symptoms reported.

A method to increase pilot resistance to airsickness consists of repetitive exposure to the flying conditions that initially resulted in airsickness. In other words, repeated exposure to the flight environment decreases an individual’s susceptibility to subsequent airsickness. Recently, several devices have been introduced that are intended to reduce motion sickness through stimulation of various body parts (usually the wrist).

Simulator sickness is a subset of motion sickness that is typically experienced by pilots who undergo training for extended periods of time in flight simulators. Due to the spatial limitations imposed on these simulators, perceived discrepancies between the motion of the simulator and that of the vehicle can occur and lead to simulator sickness.

It is similar to motion sickness in many ways, but occurs in simulated environments and can be induced without actual motion. Symptoms of simulator sickness include discomfort, apathy, drowsiness, disorientation, fatigue, vomiting, and many more.

These symptoms can reduce the effectiveness of simulators in flight training and result in systematic consequences such as decreased simulator use, compromised training, ground safety, and flight safety. Pilots are less likely to want to repeat the experience in a simulator if they have suffered from simulator sickness and hence can reduce the number of potential users. It can also compromise training in two safety-critical ways:

1. It can distract the pilot during training sessions.

2. It can cause the pilot to adopt certain counterproductive behaviors to prevent symptoms from occurring.

Simulator sickness can also have post-training effects that can compromise safety after the simulator session, such as when the pilots drive away from the facility or fly while experiencing symptoms of simulator sickness.

Travelers who are susceptible to motion sickness can minimize symptoms by:

- Choosing a window seat with a view of the ground or of lower clouds, such that motion can be detected. This will not work if the plane is flown in the clouds for a long duration.

- Choosing seats with the smoothest ride in regards to pitch (the seats over the wings in an airplane). (This may not be sufficient for sensitive individuals who need to see ground movement)

- Sitting facing forward while focusing on distant objects rather than trying to read or look at something inside the airplane.

- Eating dry crackers, olives or suck on a lemon, to dry out the mouth, lessening nausea.

- Drinking a carbonated beverage.

Space motion sickness is caused by changes in g-forces, which affect spatial orientation in humans. According to "Science Daily", "Gravity plays a major role in our spatial orientation. Changes in gravitational forces, such as the transition to weightlessness during a space voyage, influence our spatial orientation and require adaptation by many of the physiological processes in which our balance system plays a part. As long as this adaptation is incomplete, this can be coupled to motion sickness (nausea), visual illusions and disorientation."

Modern motion-sickness medications can counter space sickness but are rarely used because it is considered better to allow space travelers to adapt naturally over the first day or two than to suffer the drowsiness and other side effects of medication. However, transdermal dimenhydrinate anti-nausea patches are typically used whenever space suits are worn because vomiting into a space suit could be fatal, as it could obscure vision or block airflow. Space suits are generally worn during launch and landing by NASA crew members and always for extra-vehicular activities (EVAs). EVAs are consequently not usually scheduled for the first days of a mission to allow the crew to adapt, and transdermal dimenhydrinate patches are typically used as an additional backup measure.

A typical method for determining the effects of the sopite syndrome is through the use of one or several questionnaires. The available questionnaires for motion sickness and sopite syndrome are described by Lawson. Two such questionnaires widely used to evaluate motion sickness are the Pensacola Diagnostic Index and the Motion Sickness Questionnaire. These questionnaires are limited, however, in that they group symptoms of drowsiness with other non-sopite related effects, such as nausea and dizziness. Motion sickness is measured based on the cumulative ratings of all these symptoms without distinguishing different levels for each effect.

A Motion Sickness Assessment Questionnaire has been developed to test the multiple dimensions of motion sickness more thoroughly; this survey defines motion sickness as gastrointestinal (involving nausea), peripheral (referring to thermoregulatory effects such as clamminess and sweating), central (involving symptoms such as dizziness and lightheadedness), and sopite-related. This questionnaire may more accurately determine how subjects experience sopite symptoms relative to other motion sickness effects. Another questionnaire designed to measure sleepiness is the Epworth Sleepiness Scale.

An optokinetic drum may be used to study visually induced sopite effects. The optokinetic drum is a rotating instrument in which test subjects are seated facing the wall of the drum. The interior surface of the drum is normally striped; thus, as the drum rotates, the subject’s eyes are subject to a moving visual field while the subject remains stationary. The speed of the drum and the duration of the test may be varied. Control groups are placed in a drum without stripes or rotation. After exposure to the rotating drum, subjects are surveyed to determine their susceptibility to motion sickness. A study in which the optokinetic drum was used to test the symptoms of the sopite syndrome showed increased mood changes in response to the visual cues, though these effects were compounded by other environmental factors such as boredom and lack of activity.

Space motion sickness was effectively unknown during the earliest spaceflights as these were undertaken in very cramped conditions; it seems to be aggravated by being able to freely move around and so is more common in larger spacecraft. After the "Apollo 8" and "Apollo 9" flights, where astronauts reported space motion sickness to Mission Control and then were subsequently removed from the flight list, astronauts (e.g. the Skylab 4 crew) attempted to prevent Mission Control from learning about their own SAS experience, apparently out of concern for their future flight assignment potential.

As with sea sickness and car sickness, space motion sickness symptoms can vary from mild nausea and disorientation, to vomiting and intense discomfort; headaches and nausea are often reported in varying degrees. About half of sufferers experience mild symptoms; only around 10% suffer severely. The most extreme reaction yet recorded was that felt by Senator Jake Garn in 1985. After his flight NASA jokingly began using the informal "Garn scale" to measure reactions to space sickness. In most cases, symptoms last from 2–4 days. In an interview with Carol Butler, when asked about the origins of "Garn", Robert E. Stevenson was quoted as saying:

Decompression sickness should be suspected if any of the symptoms associated with the condition occurs following a drop in pressure, in particular, within 24 hours of diving. In 1995, 95% of all cases reported to Divers Alert Network had shown symptoms within 24 hours. An alternative diagnosis should be suspected if severe symptoms begin more than six hours following decompression without an altitude exposure or if any symptom occurs more than 24 hours after surfacing. The diagnosis is confirmed if the symptoms are relieved by recompression. Although MRI or CT can frequently identify bubbles in DCS, they are not as good at determining the diagnosis as a proper history of the event and description of the symptoms.

"Vertigo" is often used (incorrectly) to describe a fear of heights, but it is more accurately a spinning sensation that occurs when one is not actually spinning. It can be triggered by looking down from a high place, or by looking straight up at a high place or tall object, but this alone does not describe vertigo. True vertigo can be triggered by almost any type of movement (e.g. standing up, sitting down, walking) or change in visual perspective (e.g. squatting down, walking up or down stairs, looking out of the window of a moving car or train). Vertigo is called "height vertigo" when the sensation of vertigo is triggered by heights.

Some desensitization treatments produce short-term improvements in symptoms. Long-term treatment success has been elusive.

Immediate treatment with 100% oxygen, followed by recompression in a hyperbaric chamber, will in most cases result in no long-term effects. However, permanent long-term injury from DCS is possible. Three-month follow-ups on diving accidents reported to DAN in 1987 showed 14.3% of the 268 divers surveyed had ongoing symptoms of Type II DCS, and 7% from Type I DCS. Long-term follow-ups showed similar results, with 16% having permanent neurological sequelae.

There is a lack of good evidence to support the use of any particular intervention for morning sickness.

Thalidomide was originally developed and prescribed as a cure for morning sickness in West Germany, but its use was discontinued when it was found to cause birth defects. The United States Food and Drug Administration never approved thalidomide for use as a cure for morning sickness.

Diagnosis can be assisted with a number of different scoring systems.

The cause is the most mysterious aspect of the disease. Commentators then and now put much blame on the generally poor sanitation, sewage and contaminated water supplies of the time, which might have harboured the source of infection. The first outbreak at the end of the Wars of the Roses means that it may have been brought over from France by the French mercenaries whom Henry VII used to gain the English throne. However, the "Croyland Chronicle" mentions that Thomas Stanley, 1st Earl of Derby used the "sweating sickness" as an excuse not to join with Richard III's army prior to the Battle of Bosworth.

Relapsing fever has been proposed as a possible cause. This disease, which is spread by ticks and lice, occurs most often during the summer months, as did the original sweating sickness. However, relapsing fever is marked by a prominent black scab at the site of the tick bite and a subsequent skin rash.

Noting symptom overlap with hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, several scientists proposed an unknown hantavirus as the cause. A critique of this hypothesis included the argument that, whereas sweating sickness was thought to be transmitted from human to human, hantaviruses are rarely spread in this way. However, infection via human-to-human contact has been proven in hantavirus outbreaks in Argentina.

Religious leaders within the Navajo tribe repeatedly perform ceremonies to eliminate the all-consuming thoughts of the dead.

Because they can produce a fear of both suffocation and restriction, MRI scans often prove difficult for claustrophobic patients. In fact, estimates say that anywhere from 4–20% of patients refuse to go through with the scan for precisely this reason. One study estimates that this percentage could be as high as 37% of all MRI recipients. The average MRI takes around 50 minutes; this is more than enough time to evoke extreme fear and anxiety in a severely claustrophobic patient.

This study was conducted with three goals: 1. To discover the extent of anxiety during an MRI. 2. To find predictors for anxiety during an MRI. 3. To observe psychological factors of undergoing an MRI. Eighty patients were randomly chosen for this study and subjected to several diagnostic tests to rate their level of claustrophobic fear; none of these patients had previously been diagnosed with claustrophobia. They were also subjected to several of the same tests after their MRI to see if their anxiety levels had elevated. This experiment concludes that the primary component of anxiety experienced by patients was most closely connected to claustrophobia.

This assertion stems from the high Claustrophobic Questionnaire results of those who reported anxiety during the scan. Almost 25% of the patients reported at least moderate feelings of anxiety during the scan and 3 were unable to complete the scan at all. When asked a month after their scan, 30% of patients (these numbers are taken of the 48 that responded a month later) reported that their claustrophobic feelings had elevated since the scan. The majority of these patients claimed to have never had claustrophobic sensations up to that point. This study concludes that the Claustrophobic Questionnaire (or an equivalent method of diagnosis) should be used before allowing someone to have an MRI.

In high-altitude conditions, oxygen enrichment can counteract the hypoxia related effects of altitude sickness. A small amount of supplemental oxygen reduces the equivalent altitude in climate-controlled rooms. At (), raising the oxygen concentration level by 5% via an oxygen concentrator and an existing ventilation system provides an effective altitude of (), which is more tolerable for those unaccustomed to high altitudes.

Oxygen from gas bottles or liquid containers can be applied directly via a nasal cannula or mask. Oxygen concentrators based upon pressure swing adsorption (PSA), VSA, or vacuum-pressure swing adsorption (VPSA) can be used to generate the oxygen if electricity is available. Stationary oxygen concentrators typically use PSA technology, which has performance degradations at the lower barometric pressures at high altitudes. One way to compensate for the performance degradation is to utilize a concentrator with more flow capacity. There are also portable oxygen concentrators that can be used on vehicular DC power or on internal batteries, and at least one system commercially available measures and compensates for the altitude effect on its performance up to . The application of high-purity oxygen from one of these methods increases the partial pressure of oxygen by raising the FiO (fraction of inspired oxygen).

This method was developed by Rachman and Taylor, two experts in the field, in 1993. This method is effective in distinguishing symptoms stemming from fear of suffocation and fear of restriction. In 2001, it was modified from 36 to 24 items by another group of field experts. This study has also been proven very effective by various studies.

The symptoms and signs, as described by physician John Caius and others, were as follows: the disease began very suddenly with a sense of apprehension, followed by cold shivers (sometimes very violent), giddiness, headache, and severe pains in the neck, shoulders and limbs, with great exhaustion. After the cold stage, which might last from half an hour to three hours, the hot and sweating stage followed. The characteristic sweat broke out suddenly without any obvious cause. Accompanying the sweat, or after, was a sense of heat, headache, delirium, rapid pulse, and intense thirst. Palpitation and pain in the heart were frequent symptoms. No skin eruptions were noted by observers including Caius. In the final stages, there was either general exhaustion and collapse, or an irresistible urge to sleep, which Caius thought to be fatal if the patient was permitted to give way to it. One attack did not offer immunity, and some people suffered several bouts before dying. The disease tended to occur in summer and early autumn.

The fear of spiders can be treated by any of the general techniques suggested for specific phobias. The first line of treatment is systematic desensitization – also known as exposure therapy – which was first described by South African psychiatrist Joseph Wolpe. Before engaging in systematic desensitization it is common to train the individual with arachnophobia in relaxation techniques, which will help keep the patient calm. Systematic desensitization can be done in vivo (with live spiders) or by getting the individual to imagine situations involving spiders, then modelling interaction with spiders for the person affected and eventually interacting with real spiders. This technique can be effective in just one session.

Recent advances in technology have enabled the use of virtual or augmented reality spiders for use in therapy. These techniques have proven to be effective.

In the Muscogee (Creek) culture, it is believed that everyone is a part of an energy called "Ibofanga". This energy supposedly results from the flow between mind, body, and spirit. Illness can result from this flow being disrupted. Therefore, their "medicine is used to prevent or treat an obstruction and restore the peaceful flow of energy within a person". Purification rituals for mourning "focus on preventing unnatural or prolonged emotional and physical drain."

The grief resolution processes for traditional Native Americans are qualitatively different than those usually seen in mainstream Western cultures. In 1881, there was a federal ban on some of the traditional mourning rituals practised by the Lakota and other tribes. Lakota expert Maria Yellow Horse Brave Heart proposes that the loss of these rituals may have caused the Lakota to be "further predisposed to the development of pathological grief". Some manifestations of unresolved grief include seeking visions of the spirits of deceased relatives, obsessive reminiscing about the deceased, longing for and believing in a reunion with the deceased, fantasies of reappearance of the deceased, and belief in one's ability to project oneself to the past or to the future.