Departments of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.
Otorhinolaryngology, Faculty of Medicine, Cumhuriyet University, Sivas, Turkey.
J Nerv Ment Dis. 2020 Jun;208(6):476-480. doi: 10.1097/NMD.0000000000001148.
Some researchers have suggested that olfactory deficits might be a sensitive marker for depression in adults. However, olfactory function has not been well studied in relation to depression among children and adolescents. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of depression on olfactory function of adolescents. The olfactory threshold, odor identification, and discrimination abilities of adolescents aged 12 to 17 (43 adolescents with major depressive disorder and 43 healthy controls) alongside their sum were evaluated using the Sniffin' Sticks extended test. Olfactory scores were similar between the groups. However, depressed adolescents perceived their own olfactory function scores significantly lower than the measured values. No correlation was found between olfactory scores and age, sex, severity of depression, and duration of depression. This study conducted with a small sample size revealed that olfactory function of the adolescents with depression was similar to olfactory function of the healthy adolescents. It is required to conduct further adequately powered, longitudinal studies in order to verify these results.
一些研究人员认为，嗅觉缺陷可能是成年人抑郁的一个敏感标志物。然而，在儿童和青少年中，与抑郁相关的嗅觉功能尚未得到很好的研究。本研究旨在评估抑郁对青少年嗅觉功能的影响。使用嗅棒扩展测试评估了年龄在 12 至 17 岁的青少年（43 名患有重度抑郁症的青少年和 43 名健康对照者）的嗅觉阈值、气味识别和辨别能力及其总和。两组的嗅觉评分相似。然而，抑郁的青少年对自己的嗅觉功能评分的感知明显低于测量值。嗅觉评分与年龄、性别、抑郁严重程度和抑郁持续时间之间没有相关性。这项研究样本量较小，结果表明，患有抑郁症的青少年的嗅觉功能与健康青少年的嗅觉功能相似。需要进行进一步的、有足够样本量的、纵向研究来验证这些结果。
