[Threshold for electric stimulation of taste in diabetes mellitus]

Abstract

This paper informs about the electrogustometrically determined stimulus-threshold of gustation in 82 patients with diabetes mellitus in comparison with a group of 107 non-diabetics without disturbance of gustation. The stimulation of the tongue was performed with a unipolar electrode switches as a cathode. The electric impulse was measured in microA and the threshold was found to increase with age, in general. In both groups the thresholds tend to higher values in males in contrast to females as well as smokers opposed to non-smokers. With references to the control group the diabetics showed higher values in the electric taste threshold (statistically significant with P = 0.1%). It was noticed that in the diabetics at the tip of the tongue a higher threshold was present than at the margins of the tongue, being in the inverse ratio to the control group and to normal.