Longitudinal study of factors affecting taste sense decline in old‐old individuals

Abstract

The sense of taste plays a pivotal role for personal assessment of the nutritional value, safety and quality of foods. Although it is commonly recognised that taste sensitivity decreases with age, alterations in that sensitivity over time in an old-old population have not been previously reported. Furthermore, no known studies utilised comprehensive variables regarding taste changes and related factors for assessments. Here, we report novel findings from a 3-year longitudinal study model aimed to elucidate taste sensitivity decline and its related factors in old-old individuals. We utilised 621 subjects aged 79-81 years who participated in the Septuagenarians, Octogenarians, Nonagenarians Investigation with Centenarians Study for baseline assessments performed in 2011 and 2012, and then conducted follow-up assessments 3 years later in 328 of those. Assessment of general health, an oral examination and determination of taste sensitivity were performed for each. We also evaluated cognitive function using Montreal Cognitive Assessment findings, then excluded from analysis those with a score lower than 20 in order to secure the validity and reliability of the subjects' answers. Contributing variables were selected using univariate analysis, then analysed with multivariate logistic regression analysis. We found that males showed significantly greater declines in taste sensitivity for sweet and sour tastes than females. Additionally, subjects with lower cognitive scores showed a significantly greater taste decrease for salty in multivariate analysis. In conclusion, our longitudinal study revealed that gender and cognitive status are major factors affecting taste sensitivity in geriatric individuals.

Effects of aging on taste thresholds: A case of Asian people

“…Effects of aging on sweet threshold values reported in the literature varied among studies. Increases in sweet threshold values have been reported previously in Japanese (Fukunaga et al, 2005;Ogawa et al, 2017) and Korean elderly subjects (Lee et al, 2013). Yoshinaka et al (2015) found no difference in sweet recognition thresholds between Japanese subjects of ages 24-32 and 69-71 years, however, an increase in threshold value was observed after 79 years of age.…”

“…Wardwell et al () found a significant increase in threshold value of caffeine with aging in both male and female subjects, while they found significant increases in threshold values of sucrose, NaCl, and citric acid only in male subjects. Studies that used quinine hydrochloride, another bitter compound, also reported decreased threshold value of the compound with aging in Japanese (Fukunaga et al, ; Ogawa et al, ; Yoshinaka et al, ) and Korean subjects (Lee et al, ).…”

“…Increases in threshold value of NaCl with aging have been reported in Caucasian (Mojet et al, ), Japanese (Fukunaga et al, ; Yoshinaka et al, ), and Korean (Lee et al, ) subjects. Ogawa et al () suggested that cognitive status was the major factor affecting salty taste sensitivity in the elderly since elderly subjects with lower cognitive scores showed a significantly greater decline in salty taste perception. Limited number of studies used KCl to investigate the effect of aging on salty taste perception, one of which was conducted by Mojet et al () who reported an increase in threshold value of KCl with aging in Caucasian subjects.…”

“…Most of the studies were conducted with populations in western countries such as the United States (Sanders & Ayers, ; Wardwell, Chapman‐Novakofski, & Brewer, ), The Netherlands (Mojet, Christ‐Hazelhof, & Heidema, ), UK (Kennedy, Law, Methven, Mottram, & Gosney, ), and Brazil (Neumann, Schauren, & Adami, ), among others. Very few studies were conducted with populations in Asian countries and in those few studies the focus has been placed on Korean (Lee, Shin, Rhyu, Kim, & Ye, ) and Japanese (Fukunaga, Uematsu, & Sugimoto, ; Ogawa et al, ; Sasano, Satoh‐Kuriwada, & Shoji, ; Yoshinaka et al, ) populations.…”

Sensibilidade gustativa em idosos: uma revisão narrativa

“…Em um estudo realizado por Ogawa e colaboradores, 34 foi relatado novos achados de um modelo de estudo longitudinal que teve como objetivo elucidar o declínio da sensibilidade ao gosto e seus fatores relacionados em indivíduos idosos. A amostra foi constituída por 328 sujeitos com idade entre 79-81 anos.…”