Anyone had problems with this ?

A friend has been suffering with this for years, been to numerous medical facilities and tried all different kinds of treatments with no results

A new approach is needed, all suggestions are welcome

I know there is a surgical procedure to help. I think it deals with the ducts from your ears to your throat.

I have very personal experience with this. I was living in Boston in 2013 and getting my pilot's license (which I never finished but hope to) thanks to being incorrectly diagnosed with advanced bilateral Meniere's disease by 6 different Ear Nose throat specialists. I was also told I could never recover and would eventually become deaf (even though my hearing was perfect) as well and to forget about flying or even driving which I continued to do anyway.

I eventually went to a place called Mass Eye and Ear in Boston which is one of the top hospitals for balance issues and anything inner ear related. It turned out my balance issues which were better described as (stuff moving side to side in my vision like you're on a boat partial rotational vertigo) was due to allergies and undiagnosed migraines. I started an elimination diet and found that cutting out nightshades and avoiding beer as well as generally cutting carbs cured me completely. The thing is vertigo could be could neurological or come from the inner ear. They key is to get a good doctor and of course the right diagnosis because the treatments will be very different. I'm sure your friend has had multiple tests but the ones they commonly due for the inner ear are the caloric ones where they inject water or air into the inner ear to stimulate the inner ear canals and measure the nystagmus response. Trouble is, the test, especially when done with air, generates a lot of false positives but since it's cheaper they do it more often. That's how I got misdiagnosed. One crappy cheap test result that doc refused to repeat.

The doc at Mass Eye used a more reliable test that came back totally normal 6 years after I went thru this crap. Also, a test called, rotatory chair testing (where they spin you around in a chair at a relatively low frequency) is much more reliable and less prone to error which is what sealed my migraine diagnosis. He offered me drug treatments as a last resort but preferred I tried to the elimination diet first which I was totally onboard with since a lot of the migraine drugs are off label use of anti depressants which I would never want to take anyway.

Sorry for the long post. Hope this is in anyway useful and your friend finds relief. I know it was frustrating when I dealt with it.