Speech therapy program for the rehabilitation of smell.
Carla Patrícia Hernandez Alves Ribeiro César, Keyllam Machado de Lima, Otávio Messias Silva de Oliveira and 6 others
PMID 41919834WHAT IT FOUND
Eight adults with smell loss one to two years after severe COVID-19 completed a speech therapy program and daily home smell training.
All improved and the authors report normal smell restored in 75%, but everyone was treated, so there was no comparison group.
Key findings
01Every patient's smell score was higher after the program than before it, and the authors report normal smell was restored in 75% of cases.
02The program combined in-person sessions, a nasal airflow manoeuvre, nasal hygiene and bandaging, odour and taste work, and daily home training, so the effect of any single part cannot be separated from the rest.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
Only eight patients finished the program, while the authors' own sample size calculation called for 13; the authors state that the small sample prevents generalisation. There is no untreated comparison group. Everyone received the program, so it is not possible to tell how much of the improvement came from the treatment. No statistical test is reported, so the claim that patients improved rests on before-and-after scores from eight people. All participants had been hospitalised with severe COVID-19 and were between 18 and 60 years old, so the results say nothing about smell loss from other causes, or about patients older or less severely affected than this group.
Declared interests
The work was funded by Brazil's National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) under its Universal Project, grant 402791/2021-5. No competing interests are declared. MedSmell is named as the maker of the smell test kit and the home training kit used, but the paper does not say whether that company had any role in the study.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read this as proof that the program restores smell. All eight patients were treated and there was no untreated comparison group, and the paper reports no statistical test, so some or all of the improvement may have happened without it. The study was also planned for 13 participants and finished with eight.
Summarised by AI from the full paper, without a clinician reviewing it. Check it against the source before it changes what you do. Read it on PubMed →