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Background: In recent years alterations of the sense of smell are taking special interest in the medical community. Although adult patients and the elderly make up the highest percentage, there is a current increase in children in the ORL consultation and other specialties by hyposmia, anosmia or disosmias. The specialized bibliography refers as the most frequent clinical entities that cause olfactory disorders in the pediatric population: rhinosinusitis, adenoids and skull injuries, followed by congenital anosmia, isolated or associated with other anomalies such as Kallmann syndrome. These children may suffer nutritional disturbances and little recognition of the dangers and the pleasures of the environment. Objective: To inform about the different causes of olfactory pathology found in a group of children, through a clinical and olfactometric evaluation. Patients and method: A retrospective study was done with 10 children with various diseases affecting the sense of smell and a control group of 10 healthy children, who were underwent to an ORL and chemosensory clinical evaluation. The olfactometric method CCCRC, modified, was used as well as a brief smell identification test. Results: Group control: 8 children scored normosmia and 2 hyposmia. Group of patients: 2 with chronic rhinosinusitis and anosmia, 2 with amygdalin hypertrophy and adenoid vegetations and hyposmia, 2 with congenital anosmia, 2 idiopathic: one with hyposmia and 1 anosmia, 1 with skull injury and hyposmia and 1 with post viral and hyposmia. Conclusions: The clinical and olfactometric evaluation of pediatric patients resulted in different etiologies of olfactory disorders. The knowledge of them will allow the diagnosis and treatment for a better quality of life of the children evaluated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a preregistered, cross-sectional study, we investigated whether olfactory loss is a reliable predictor of COVID-19 using a crowdsourced questionnaire in 23 languages to assess symptoms in individuals self-reporting recent respiratory illness. We quantified changes in chemosensory abilities during the course of the respiratory illness using 0–100 visual analog scales (VAS) for participants reporting a positive (C19+; n = 4148) or negative (C19−; n = 546) COVID-19 laboratory test outcome. Logistic regression models identified univariate and multivariate predictors of COVID-19 status and post-COVID-19 olfactory recovery. Both C19+ and C19− groups exhibited smell loss, but it was significantly larger in C19+ participants (mean ± SD, C19+: −82.5 ± 27.2 points; C19−: −59.8 ± 37.7). Smell loss during illness was the best predictor of COVID-19 in both univariate and multivariate models (ROC AUC = 0.72). Additional variables provide negligible model improvement. VAS ratings of smell loss were more predictive than binary chemosensory yes/no-questions or other cardinal symptoms (e.g. fever). Olfactory recovery within 40 days of respiratory symptom onset was reported for ~50% of participants and was best predicted by time since respiratory symptom onset. We find that quantified smell loss is the best predictor of COVID-19 amongst those with symptoms of respiratory illness. To aid clinicians and contact tracers in identifying individuals with a high likelihood of having COVID-19, we propose a novel 0–10 scale to screen for recent olfactory loss, the ODoR-19. We find that numeric ratings ≤2 indicate high odds of symptomatic COVID-19 (4 < OR < 10). Once independently validated, this tool could be deployed when viral lab tests are impractical or unavailable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]