Givaudan-Roure Lecture - Association for Chemoreception Sciences

117 Poster [ ] Clinical Evaluation and Consumer Research
ODOR CONDITIONING AND THE STRESS RESPONSE
Maute C. 1, Dalton P. 1, Michele G. 1 1Monell Chemical Senses Center,
Philadelphia, PA
The present study evaluated the degree to which an emotional state
(i.e. stress or relaxation) initially experienced in the presence of a novel
odor could later be elicited by the odor alone. Evaluations of both
subjective (self-reported stress, health symptoms and mood) and
objective (salivary cortisol) indices of stress demonstrated the efficacy
of the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) as a stress manipulation. Further,
salivary cortisol levels revealed that subjects who were administered the
(TSST) in the presence of a novel odor were more stressed upon reexposure
to that odor than they were upon re-exposure to a different
odor that had been paired with relaxation instructions. This apparent
ability to induce stress below the level of awareness and its relevance to
odor-conditioned stress responses as a potential mechanism underlying
persistent aftereffects of trauma and odor-associated syndromes, such as
multiple chemical sensitivity, will be discussed.
Supported by DAMD17-01-2-0782
118 Poster [ ] Clinical Evaluation and Consumer Research
THE IMPACT OF MALINGERING ON THREE MEASURES OF
OLFACTION
Bailie J.M. 1, Rybalsky K. 1, Horning K.A. 1, Hoffman S.M. 1, Gesteland
R.C. 2, Frank R.A. 1 1Psychology, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati,
OH; 2Cell Biology, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH
Experts on the sense of smell are occasionally asked to evaluate
olfaction in forensic cases. Since it has been estimated that the faking of
a physical injury, sensory or cognitive loss (known as malingering)
occurs in as many as one out of six of these cases, it is valuable to have
a measure of olfaction that is resistant to malingering. The Sniff
Magnitude Test (SMT) is a newly-developed measure of olfactory
function that uses sniffing responses to assess the sense of smell. The
SMT may be resistant to malingering because it has low difficulty and
at the same time it is not obvious to a typical patient how an olfactory
loss is feigned. A total of 120 subjects were randomly assigned into
four groups: a control group that received the standard administration of
each olfactory test, Malingering Group 1 that received instruction to
fake an olfactory loss but was not provided further instructions,
Malingering Group 2 that was told to fake a loss and was given
information about what each test measures, and Malingering Group 3
that was told to fake a loss and was coached on how to appear anosmic
on each of the three tests. The SMT was compared to two traditional
tests- PEA odor threshold and performance on the UPSIT. Results are
discussed in terms of the impact of test information on feigning an
olfactory loss and the resistance of each test to malingering. This
project supported by NIH SBIR grant DC04139, R. C. Gesteland, PI.
30
119 Poster [ ] Clinical Evaluation and Consumer Research
UNILATERAL OLFACTORY THRESHOLDS IN A
CHEMOSENSORY CLINICAL POPULATION
Cowart B.J. 1, Pribitkin E. 2, Rosen D. 2, Klock C. 1, Laflam T. 1 1Monell
Chemical Senses Center, Philadelphia, PA; 2Otolaryngology-Head &
Neck Surgery, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, PA
Although unilateral (UNI) testing of olfactory threshold sensitivity is
routinely performed in many chemosensory clinics to supplement
bilateral (BI) tests, few studies have addressed the usefulness of these
additional measures in either characterizing individual patients or
providing insight into general characteristics of olfactory dysfunction.
We report findings from 195 non-anosmic patients presenting to the
Monell-Jefferson Taste & Smell Clinic who underwent both BI and
UNI tests of thresholds for phenylethyl alcohol (PEA); BI and UNI
thresholds for pyridine (PYR) were also obtained from a subset (n=73).
37.4% of patients showed a left(L)-right(R) difference of at least one
log step in PEA threshold concentration (v/v), but only 54.8% of those
also showed a directionally consistent L-R difference in PYR
thresholds. The presence of a UNI difference was not related to either
degree of bilateral dysfunction or etiology; however, UNI testing did
enable the identification of an olfactory problem in 15 patients whose
BI testing yielded no evidence of abnormality. In contrast to what has
been reported in largely non-clinical populations, patients´ best UNI
thresholds for PEA were significantly poorer than their BI thresholds.
Interestingly, however, this effect interacted with the presence of a L-R
difference, being evident only in patients with comparable L-R
thresholds. Thus bilateral facilitation of olfactory threshold sensitivity
may occur in dysfunction when the two nostrils are similarly affected.
Supported by NIH grant P50 DC00214.
120 Poster [ ] Clinical Evaluation and Consumer Research
CLINICAL EVALUATION OF THE SNIFF MAGNITUDE TEST
Frank R.A. 1, Seiden A. 2, Bailie J. 1, Rybalsky K. 1, Gesteland R.C. 3
1Psychology, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH; 2Otolaryngology
and Maxillofacial Surgery, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH;
3Cell Biology, Univ of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH
The Sniff Magnitude Test (SMT) is a newly developed olfactory
measure that examines sniff patterns to assess smell function. Its utility
has been assessed in children, university students, and older adults
where it has proven to be a reliable measure that is strongly correlated
with the UPSIT and odor threshold tests. This project examined the use
of the SMT in a clinical setting. 44 otolaryngology patients completed
the UPSIT and SMT during a visit to an ENT clinic in Cincinnati, Ohio.
Patients who came to the clinic for olfactory complaints were compared
to patients that came in for sinus-related problems and patients with
hearing-related complaints. It was predicted that the olfactory complaint
group would perform more poorly than the sinus and hearing groups on
both the UPSIT and SMT. Patients with complaints about the sense of
smell performed significantly worse on both the UPSIT and SMT
compared to the sinus patients [F(1, 30) = 9.89, p< .005 and F (1, 33) =
9.90, p < .005, respectively]. This was also the case for the participants
who had hearing complaints [F(1, 26) = 25.083, p < .001 and F(1, 29)
=12.36, p < .001, respectively]. There was no difference between the
sinus and hearing patients on the two olfactory tests. These results
demonstrate the utility of the SMT in a clinical setting and support
additional studies of its use in other clinical conditions where olfactory
deficits are a concern. This project supported by NIH SBIR grant
DC04139, R. C. Gesteland, PI.