Prevalence of gustatory changes in elderly people under chronic medication use

• Autor(a) principal: Lopes,Ana Carolina Freire
• Data de Publicação: 2015
• Outros Autores: Pereira,Camila Salles Silva, Fernandes,Fernanda Lima, Valente,Laura Cotta, Valadão,Analina Furtado, Abreu,Mery Natali da Silva, Motta,Patrícia Gonçalves da
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Geriatrics, Gerontology and Aging (Online)
• Texto Completo: https://ggaging.com/details/41
• topic: aged; taste; pharmaceutical preparations.

<p><b>OBJECTIVE:</b> To investigate the medication classes used, and which are likely to produce gustatory changes in elderly people and to identify the most prevalent gustatory change types.<br> <b>METHODS:</b> The sample comprised 203 elderly from the Retiree and Pensioner Metal Workers Association of Ipatinga, Minas Gerais, Brazil, aged 60 years or older, from both genders, who make chronic use of any medication. The three-droplet test, which evaluates the four primary tastes, was used to investigate these elderly gustatory functions.<br> <b>RESULTS:</b> The medication classes most commonly used by the elderly were anti-hypertensive (70.9%), lipid-lowering (36.0%), antacid (19.2%), oral hypoglycemic (17.7%), anti-platelet (15.3%), thyroid hormone (13.3%), antidepressant (11.3%) and benzodiazepines (9.4%). Elderly people using antihypertensive medications showed more chances of having gustatory changes for salty flavors (OR = 2.4; 95%CI 1.2 - 4.6) and sweet flavors (OR = 2.3; 95%CI 1.2 - 4.4). Among the antihypertensive medications, beta-blockers (OR = 1.8; 95%CI 1.3 - 4.2) and diuretic drugs (OR = 2.0; 95%CI 1.0 - 3.8) increased the patients' chance of developing gustatory changes for sweet flavors. The other antihypertensive classes, as well as antidepressant and antiplatelet medications were not significantly associated with gustatory changes. It was observed that 41.4% of the sample showed gustatory changes for salty tastes, 40.4% of them showed gustatory changes for sweet tastes, 14.3% for acid tastes and 13.8% for bitter tastes.<br> <b>CONCLUSION:</b> This study showed the chronic medication use may lead to gustatory changes in elderly people, especially for sweet tastes. Among the medications evaluated, antihypertensive stood out among the medication classes, specifically beta-blockers and diuretics.</p>