Word: hypogeusia
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What tastes like ambrosia to one man, observed the ancients, may sit like ashes on the tongue of another. Now modern medicine has discovered that a single tongue can be just as unpredictable -if its unfortunate owner suffers from idiopathic hypogeusia.* The newly identified ailment, described by National Institutes of Health researchers in the Journal of the American Medical Association, attacks the senses of taste and smell to the point that the patients may become unable to detect all but the strongest flavors or aromas. In severe cases, a victim's favorite food odors may become offensive...
...team became interested in the condition when baffled private physicians began referring individual patients to neurologists. The Government scientists studied 35 of the 3,000 Americans known to suffer from idiopathic hypogeusia. The doctors confirmed the symptoms by placing drops of sour, sweet, salt and bitter solutions on the subjects' tongues and holding solutions smelling like onions or burned rubber under their noses. The NIH researchers were puzzled as to the cause of the condition but decided that it does not appear to be psychosomatic. At least half of the patients developed their symptoms following influenza-like illnesses. Others...
...cases where both taste and smell were affected, the patients suffered more intensely. A 48-year-old professional soldier who developed hypogeusia following an intestinal operation found himself unable to stand the taste or smell of most foods. A 53-year-old pizza maker said that many foods "smelled or tasted like manure or decayed garbage." He had to quit his job and limit himself to a bland diet. Some victims became so depressed that they contemplated suicide...
...Idiopathic means of unknown or spontaneous origin; hypogeusia means diminished taste acuity...
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