The sense of taste is generally regarded as less important compare with vision and hearing. However, gustatory disorder considerably diminish the pleasures of life. The causes of taste disorder are various, and can occur during different pharmacologic treatment. We report a case of reversible ageusia induced by clopidogrel medication.
Ageusia* ; Hearing ; Humans ; Taste Disorders

No abstract available.
Ageusia* ; Humans ; Myasthenia Gravis* ; Thymoma

Acupuncture Therapy ; Adult ; Ageusia ; therapy ; Female ; Humans

OBJECTIVE: We studied whether frontal skull base fracture has an impact on the occurrence and recovery of anosmia and/or ageusia following frontal traumatic brain injury (TBI). METHODS: Between May 2003 and April 2005, 102 consecutive patients who had hemorrhage or contusion on the frontal lobe base were conservatively treated. Relevant clinical and radiographic data were collected, and assessment of impaired smell and taste sensation were also surveyed up to at least 12 months post-injury. RESULTS: Among 102 patients, anosmia was noted in 22 (21.6%), of whom 10 had ageusia at a mean 4.4 days after trauma. Bilateral frontal lobe injuries were noted in 20 of 22 patients with anosmia and in all 10 patients with ageusia. Frontal skull base fracture was noted in 41 patients, of whom 9 (21.4%) had anosmia and 4 (9.5%) had ageusia. There was no statistical difference in the occurrence of anosmia and ageusia between patients with or without fracture. Of the 22 patients with anosmia, recovery from anosmia occurred in nine (40.9%) at the interval of 6 to 24 months after trauma, of whom six had frontal skull base fracture and three were not associated with fracture. Recovery of anosmia was significantly higher in patients without fracture than those with fracture (p<0.05). Recovery from ageusia occurred in only two of 10 patients at the interval of 18 to 20 months after trauma and was not eminent in patients without fracture. CONCLUSION: One should be alert and seek possibile occurrence of the anosmia and/or ageusia following frontal TBI. It is suggested that recovery is quite less likely if such patients have fractures on the frontal base, and these patients should wait for at least 6 to 18 months to anticipate such recovery if there is no injury to the central olfactory structures.
Ageusia* ; Brain Injuries ; Contusions ; Frontal Lobe ; Hemorrhage* ; Humans ; Incidence* ; Olfaction Disorders* ; Sensation ; Skull Base ; Smell

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Phenylthiocarbamide (PTC) and its chemically related compound,6-n-propylthiouracil (PROP), both produce a taste that is extremely bitter to some subjects (tasters) but tasteless or only slightly bitter to others (non-tasters). Earlier studies had used PTC, but most investigators have switched to PROP because of its several advantages. Recently, three single nucleotide polymorphisms in the TAS2R38 gene were identified and several studies have demonstrated a strong association between these genes with taster status. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between taste thresholds of PTC and PROP and their correlation with the TAS2R38 genotype. SUBJECTS AND METHOD: Seventy-five healthy normal volunteers were included. Taster status was determined using successive solutions of PTC and PROP, which comprised a total of 15 grades. All participants were genotyped for polymorphism of the TAS2R38 gene that affects taste sensitivity to PTC and PROP. RESULTS: PTC taste thresholds showed 96% correlation with the taste thresholds for PROP. Non-tasters defined by the PTC threshold test were the exactly the same with those identified as AVI (alanine, valine, isoleucine) homozygous, but taster status determined by the PROP threshold test showed 96% correlation with the genotypes. CONCLUSION: The PTC threshold test was more reliable for determining taste blindness than the PROP threshold test.
Ageusia ; Factor IX ; Genotype ; Humans ; Phenylthiourea ; Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide ; Research Personnel ; Taste Threshold ; Valine

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Currently, the changes of taste sensation after unilateral injury of chorda tympani nerve during middle ear surgery remains unclear, particularly in objective methods, like threshold to each taste stimulus. This study aims to evaluate the objective changes of taste threshold according to the degrees of injury of chorda tympani nerve. MATERIALS AND METHODS: In 36 patients who underwent middle ear surgery, the degrees of injury were described as "intact", "stretched" and "sacrificed". The taste threshold to citric acid, NaCl, and sucrose were measured preoperatively, and 1 week, 1 month, 3 months after surgery. Subjective changes of taste sensation were questioned together. The amount of changes in threshold according to the degree of injury were statistically analyzed. RESULTS: There were no significant differences of threshold according to the degrees of injury in each taste. Several patients documented subjective taste changes, such as hypogeusia and parageusia. But there were no relationship between subjective and objective findings. CONCLUSION: These results suggest the probability of some compensatory mechanism after unilateral injury of chorda tympani nerve. There might be some discrepancy between taste threshold and real-world taste sensation.
Ageusia ; Chorda Tympani Nerve* ; Citric Acid ; Dysgeusia ; Ear, Middle* ; Humans ; Sensation ; Sucrose ; Taste Threshold

Acupuncture Therapy ; Ageusia ; complications ; therapy ; Female ; Humans ; Middle Aged ; Olfaction Disorders ; complications ; therapy

Objective: To analyze the correlation between loss of smell/taste and the number of real confirmed cases of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) worldwide based on Google Trends data, and to explore the guiding role of smell/taste loss for the COVID-19 prevention and control. Methods: "Loss of smell" and "loss of taste" related keywords were searched in the Google Trends platform, the data were obtained from Jan. 1 2019 to Jul. 11 2021. The daily and newly confirmed COVID-19 case number were collected from World Health Organization (WHO) since Dec. 30 2019. All data were statistically analyzed by SPSS 23.0 software. The correlation was finally tested by Spearman correlation analysis. Results: A total of data from 80 weeks were collected. The retrospective analysis was performed on the new trend of COVID-19 confirmed cases in a total of 186 292 441 cases worldwide. Since the epidemic of COVID-19 was recorded on the WHO website, the relative searches related to loss of smell/taste in the Google Trends platform had been increasing globally. The global relative search volumes of "loss of smell" and "loss of taste" on Google Trends was 10.23±2.58 and 16.33±2.47 before the record of epidemic while 80.25±39.81 and 80.45±40.04 after (t value was 8.67, 14.43, respectively, both P<0.001). In the United States and India, the relative searches for "loss of smell" and "loss of taste" after the record of epidemic were also much higher than before (all P<0.001). The correlation coefficients between the trend of weekly new COVID-19 cases and the Google Trends of "loss of smell" in the global, United States, and India was 0.53, 0.76, and 0.82 respectively (all P<0.001), the correlation coefficients with Google Trends of "loss of taste" was 0.54, 0.78, and 0.82 respectively (all P<0.001). The lowest and highest point of loss of smell/taste search curves of Google Trends in different periods appeared 7 to 14 days earlier than that of the weekly newly COVID-19 confirmed cases curves, respectively. Conclusions: There is a significant positive correlation between the number of newly confirmed cases of COVID-19 worldwide and the amount of keywords, such as "loss of smell" and "loss of taste", retrieved in Google Trends. The trend of big data based on Google Trends might predict the outbreak trend of COVID-19 in advance.
Ageusia ; Big Data ; COVID-19 ; Disease Outbreaks ; Humans ; Internet ; Retrospective Studies ; Smell ; United States

A new angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitor, enalapril, was administered in 20 hypertensive patients (7 mild, 6 moderate and 7 severe hypertensives) for 8 weeks or longer in order to see the blood pressure lowering effects. Additionally the left ventricular mass index was measured by 2-D guided M-mode echocardiography before and after enalapril therapy, and subjective symptoms and laboratory findings were also followed. The results were as follows: 1) After 8 weeks of enalapril treatment (the doses form 10 mg to 20mg once a day) blood pressure were lowered markedly in 10, moderately in 4, mildly in 4 cases, but the blood pressures were not lowered in 2 cases with severe hypertension. The means of the blood pressures of the group were lowered form 182.1+/-19.2 to 148.0+/-26.0mmHg in systolic and from 111.9+/-14.7 to 95.1+/-17.1mmHg in diastolic after 8 weeks of treatment (p<0.001). 2) Heart rates were not changed significantly with enalapril. 3) The symptoms of insomnia and headache were reported to be improved after enalapril in 13 cases. 4) No discernable changes in CBC and serum level of creatinine were observed. But the random urine protein was decreased in 6 cases with proteinuria in routine urinalysis. The serum lipid profile was not significantly changed, but in the 2 cases in which the ratio of total to HDL-cholesterol was above 5.0, the ratio fell to below 5.0. 5) There was no significant EKG change after enalapril. 6) In 9 cases out of 13 cases with the left ventricular mass index (LVMI) above 125g/m2 BSA, LVMI was followed by echocardiography after enalapril. LVMI was significantly decreased in 8 of 9 cases and mean values after enalapril was decreased from 183.1+/-88.0g/m2 BSA to 150.8+/-61.3g/m2 BSA (p<0.0025). 7) Side effects after enalapril administration were transient dizziness in 4 cases and ageusia in 2 cases. Above results suggest that the enalapril could be an initial choice in the treatment of essential hypertension as a single oral agent in once a day regimen resulting in good antihypertensive effects, improvement of subjective symptoms, regreassion of the left ventricular hypertrophy and few side effects.
Ageusia ; Blood Pressure ; Creatinine ; Dizziness ; Echocardiography ; Electrocardiography ; Enalapril* ; Headache ; Heart Rate ; Humans ; Hypertension ; Hypertrophy, Left Ventricular ; Peptidyl-Dipeptidase A ; Proteinuria ; Sleep Initiation and Maintenance Disorders ; Urinalysis

The generally accepted taste pathway in an animal projects ipsilaterally from the solitary nucleus. However, the path-way of gustatory fibers in the human brainstem has not been sufficiently clarified. A 57-year-old hypertensive man was admitted with sudden dizziness and hemiageusia. A neurological examination revealed also a diminution of taste on the left half of his tongue. A MRI showed a high signal intensity in the right lower pontine area. This case suggests that the unilateral lesion of the pons may lead to contralateral taste disturbances.
Ageusia ; Animals ; Brain Stem ; Cerebral Infarction ; Dizziness ; Facial Nerve ; Humans ; Infarction* ; Magnetic Resonance Imaging ; Middle Aged ; Neurologic Examination ; Pons ; Solitary Nucleus ; Tongue