Loss of Taste Buds with Age Connected to Diabetes?

The number of taste buds on the tongue declines as people age and in a new study, fewer taste buds were associated with higher fasting plasma glucose…. 

"We found that the number of taste buds on the tongue had a connection to our age and to how our body handles sugar," Chee W. Chia, MD, of the National Institute of Aging in Baltimore, Maryland told reporters at the ICE/ENDO 2014. She suggested the possibility that this could partly explain the increased incidence of type 2 diabetes seen in older adults. Dr. Chia explained how past research showed that people with type 2 diabetes and their relatives have an impaired sweet taste, which led her and colleagues to examine whether humans have any age-related decline in the number of taste buds they have.

Dr. Chia and her team analyzed data from an ongoing observational Baltimore Longitudinal Study of Aging in which 353 adults participated. The data analyzed was the participant’s body mass index, fasting plasma glucose, and the number of taste buds. Dr. Chia noted that the number of fungiform papillae, also known as taste buds, was added to the protocol in 2011 as a measure. In order to measure the number of taste buds each participant had, a blue dye was given. When the blue dye was given, the tongue turns blue, but the taste buds do not pick up the blue dye, and therefore, showed on participants’ tongues as pink dots. Those pink dots were then counted and recorded.

After appropriate adjustments were made for sex and BMI, there appeared to be a strong, negative independent association between the density of the fungiform papillae and age, and between the density of the fungiform papillae and the fasting plasma glucose.

• The number of taste buds on the tongue had a connection to age and to how the body handles sugar.
• There appeared to be a strong, negative independent association between the density of the fungiform papillae and age, and between the density of the fungiform papillae and the fasting plasma glucose.

Taste Buds Decline With Age; Is There a Link With Diabetes?

https://endo.confex.com/endo/2014endo/webprogram/Paper14044.html