Studies smell test can predict dementia?

In neurodegenerative diseases, the sense of smell is often affected early on. Now scientists have investigated whether a bad sense of smell can specifically predict the loss of memory. The result: patients with a bad sense of smell, have a five times higher risk of Alzheimer's.

Detect dementia early with the smell test? Picture: olly-fotolia

Between 2004 and 2010, the study involved a total of 1,630 older cognitively healthy participants and over 300 individuals with pre-existing mild cognitive impairment (MCI). At the beginning, participants were around 80 years old and cognitively healthy. After about 3.5 years, 1430 of the subjects could be re-examined. In 250 (17 percent) of them, the doctors found a mild cognitive impairment (MCI), at 162 an amnestic MCI.

These people had previously done significantly worse on the odor test than participants who had developed no odor problems. Alzheimer's rate was 5.2 times higher in the participants with the worst scores in the scent test than in the MCI patients with the best scores.

The study authors conclude that the smell test very easily identifies people at high risk for MCI or Alzheimer's disease. These could then be motivated to reduce their risk of dementia by means of preventive measures or to participate in clinical prevention studies.
The study can be found here.