About your Olfactory Health
Why is Smell Important?
Smelling is our ability to detect airborne volatile chemicals. If the ability to smell declines, it can affect everyday safety (e.g., food spoilage, gas), diet and nutrition, mental and physical well-being, as well as relationships. Odors can influence many aspects of our lives, such as memory, mood, and emotions. You smell hormones and can even detect genetic complexity and these molecules we smell support sustained intimacy and relationships. Smell is needed in order to form close personal bonds.
This means that smell is a very important and often overlooked part of everyone’s lives.
Most importantly, smell is a measure of brain health and can be used to screen for risk of neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s long before other symptoms show up.
Impacts
Research tells us that our ability to smell impacts our daily lives as well as our overall well-being. It is also one of the best early indicators of dementia. Improving public awareness of the connection between sense of smell and cognitive health is imperative for well-being and the early detection of disease so we can take steps towards solutions.
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Smell Training
Smell Training is the twice daily practice of smelling and identifying a set of odours. This practice has been shown to both improve the sense of smell as well as improve memory and cognitive performance. At Olfactory Health we aim to increase awareness about this kind of training as well as support members to train twice per day.
Research
Relevant research articles are linked to below.
Olfactory Training
Links to Research
Does Olfactory Training Improve Brain Function and Cognition? A Systematic Review (Link to article).
Authors: David E. Vance, Victor A. Del Bene, Vidyulata Kamath, Jennifer Sandson Frank, Rebecca Billings, Do-Yeon Cho, Jun Y. Byun, Alexandra Jacob, Joseph N. Anderson, Kristina Visscher, Kristen Triebel, Karli M. Martin, Wei Li, Frank Puga & Pariya L. Fazeli
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Olfactory training (OT), or smell training,consists of repeated exposure to odorants over time with the intended neuroplastic effect of improving or remediating olfactory functioning. Declines in olfaction parallel declines in cognition in various pathological conditions and aging.
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Research suggests a dynamic neural connection exists between olfaction and cognition. Thus, if olfactory training can improve olfaction, could it also improve cognition and support brain function?
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Yes: Overall, the systematic review found that olfactory training is associated with improved global cognition, and in particular, verbal fluency and verbal learning/memory. It is also associated with increases in the volume/size of olfactory-related brain regions, including the olfactory bulb and hippocampus, and altered functional connectivity. Interestingly, these positive effects were not limited to patients with smell loss but individuals with normal ability to smell benefitted as well.