Abstract

VELASCO-RODRIGUEZ, Raymundo et al. Quantification of the gustative threshold of the older adult and its comparison with the young individual. Rev Cubana Invest Bioméd [online]. 2008, vol.27, n.3-4, pp. 0-0. ISSN 1561-3011.

INTRODUCTION: to understand the physiologic changes that are presented during the aging will contribute to that the infirmary personnel improves the quality of the service that provides to this population. OBJECTIVES: to quantify the gustatory threshold that they present the biggest adult and to compare it with that of the youths. METHODS: I Study exploratory traverse, descriptive carried out in 68 adults bigger residents of 2 asylums to those that were applied growing solutions of sucrose topically, chloride of sodium, acetic acid and caffeine to different concentrations molars. The results were compared with the gustatory thresholds of young individuals to know if the differences were statistically significant. RESULTS: The thresholds average of the biggest adults were: for sweet 0.067 ± 0.007 mol/L; salted 0.04 ± 0.005 mol/L; acid 0.005 ± 0.0005 mol/L and for bitter 0.0000099 ± 0.0000011 mol/L. the difference among the gustatory thresholds regarding the youths, was significant for all the flavors except the acid. CONCLUSION: The process of the aging favors a significant reduction of the gustatory threshold and very probably of the perception of the flavor in the biggest adults.

Keywords : Taste aging; hreshold; nursing.