"I lost my smell and taste and now gasoline smells like onion and Coca-Cola tastes like rust"

• ISABEL MUNERA

  munerais

  Madrid

Tuesday, 15 September 2020 - 15:20

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• Covid-19.

  Loss of smell and taste and diarrhea are among the symptoms of those infected with coronaviru

• Ageusia.

  The strange disorder that makes food taste like nothing

• Documentary film.

  'The sense of cocoa.

  In search of lost taste '

«On March 18 I suddenly lost my smell or taste, as if I were something from aliens.

He couldn't smell anything or taste anything.

Little by little I was smelling and tasting certain things, but a month and a half ago the smell of gasoline began to resemble that of onion and Coca-Cola tastes like rust to me ”, confesses to EL MUNDO desperate EB, 51 years old.

This Murcian woman had a negative in the PCR test for some time, after suffering anosmia (loss of smell) and ageusia (loss of taste) due to Covid-19 in March, but the memory of the passage of the coronavirus through her body is still very present every time who eats or smells something.

Although 90% of patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 who have lost their smell and taste spontaneously recover it within a month (it is one of the most frequent symptoms of this new coronavirus), in some cases They do not do so completely and in others they present “a qualitative alteration of smell by which they perceive an odor differently from the memory they had for said stimulus.

It is what is known, in medical terminology, as

“A patient tells you that the coffee used to smell like coffee and now it doesn't.

Now it smells like something completely different (like something else or, as usual, it smells like something completely new).

In other words, for these patients the odors of certain things have radically changed ”, explains

, otolaryngologist and head of the Smell Unit at the San Carlos Clinical Hospital in Madrid.

Olfactory hallucinations

«It should not be confused with olfactory hallucination or

(when that olfactory hallucination lasts over time).

In this case, the patient can perceive a continuous odor without any actual odorant stimulus.

In other words, the patient comments that he is continually exposed to an odor that may be, for example, a burning smell, but there is no such odor: he only perceives it in his brain, "he adds.

But why in 90% of patients recovery is spontaneous and in 10%, however, not?

There are some hypotheses on the table.

“When the smell recovers completely after a viral infection of the upper tract, it is because the olfactory epithelium is undamaged and as the congestion and nasal mucus disappear, the odorant can reach the olfactory neurons and provoke a response that translates into odor.

On the contrary, when the lesion reaches the peripheral or central olfactory system, anosmia persists longer in time and can be temporary or permanent.

This could explain what happens in Covid-19, since there is a percentage of patients who report nasal obstruction and rhinorrhea, while in other patients who do not suffer from these symptoms and do have anosmia, the lesion could be located in the olfactory pathway, "he says

specialist in Otolaryngology at the Ciudad de Gijón ENT Clinic.

Illustration GABRIEL SANZ

However,

neurologist at the Quirón Salud Madrid University Hospital

, warns

: “It is still unknown why some people with Covid-19 develop anosmia and others do not, or what viral factors (such as the number of viruses in the initial inoculum, the load with the one we catch) or anatomophysiological (nasal or mouth breathing, nose geometry, etc.) may be involved ».

MM is part of that 10% that has not yet returned to normal.

«I lost my sense of smell on March 13 and to this day I still don't catch some smells.

One rainy day you go out and you don't smell anything, you open a new book and it doesn't smell anything, you take a shower and nothing, you go to the sea and neither, you hug your children and nothing ...

explains distraught.

"More recently weird smells have appeared," he continues.

And the other one is very strange, I can't describe it.

Acid?

I detect it in shampoos, natural yogurts, freshly washed clothes ... It is very unpleasant and it is new, it does not look like anything.

Both scents are far from natural, they smell chemical.

Then there is the taste of Coca-Cola, it was my favorite drink and now I can't taste it without nausea.

I don't smell the coffee, the nail polish remover, either.

Spicy chorizo ​​doesn't taste like anything to me, and zucchini does.

It's crazy, "she adds.

Ana Menoyo, 33, something similar happens.

She started with a fever on March 23 and the next day she was left without smell and taste.

«I did not have a fever again but the loss of these two senses lasted about 20 days.

As a result of that, I have noticed that there are certain foods and drinks that do not taste the same to me.

For example, soft drinks like Coca-Cola, Nestea or Aquarius taste like rust to me.

And the same thing happens with fish and seafood.

They taste very bad to me.

As for smells, especially in nature, I can be taking a walk and start smelling very green.

It is difficult to explain, but it is

,

says.

Illustration GABRIEL SANZ

Most of the patients to whom the covid has left sequelae in the form of strange smells and tastes have not sought professional help because they either do not know where to go or think they will recover spontaneously.

Laia García, 29, from Madrid, has thought several times to go to the doctor, but in the end she has been leaving him despite the fact that the smells of the street and some foods smell like rotten fish.

«

the horchata tastes like earth ... Then there are other types of foods such as coffee that do not taste bad to me but are quite different from how I they knew before, they have a burnt aftertaste and I have tried several from different coffee shops ... Anyway, all super rare since the end of March, "he explains, adding that he has been discovering what was happening to him diving online.

Olfactory training

But seeing an ENT specialist is essential if you have a persistent loss of smell, experts advise.

This professional will carry out “a detailed medical history, an examination that includes nasofibroscopy, rhinoscopy;

Imaging tests, MRIs, tests, threshold olfactometries, discrimination, identification can be requested and depending on the diagnosis, the most appropriate treatment for each patient is indicated, which can be medical treatment (with sprays, oral treatment, etc), rehabilitative treatment (olfactory training) or surgical treatment (resection of nasal lesions in the operating room) ”, points out Sarrió.

Although in those who have suffered Covid-19, the most effective, according to specialists, is olfactory training, where “the patient must be

for a few seconds, several times a day, recreating the olfactory experience;

that is, if you are looking at a lemon, remember how the lemon smelled, the sensations it produced, under what circumstances it smelled lemons, etc.), explains Ezpeleta.

“It is something simple to carry out, low cost and within the reach of anyone,” continues González, “and it has been shown that it can help patients with postviral anosmia.

They should also be informed of preventive hygiene measures, since the loss of smell can cause domestic accidents, work accidents and even eating disorders ... ».

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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