Could Losing Your Sense of Smell Be an Early Sign of Dementia?
What would you think if food no longer smelled the way it used to, or the scent of flowers seemed to fade? Most of us would brush it off as just getting older. But recent research suggests this small change may deserve a second look. In April 2026, a research team at the Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology (DGIST) in Korea published a study in Alzheimer's & Dementia. Analyzing brain tissue from donors at different stages of the disease, the team confirmed that the toxic proteins behind Alzheimer's — amyloid beta and tau — build up first in the olfactory bulb and olfactory cortex, the parts of the brain that detect and identify smells, before spreading elsewhere. It was the first study to explain, at the cellular level, why the sense of smell is damaged earliest. In other words, trouble smelling may appear years before memory problems do. Long before memory begins to slip, the nose may be sending an early signal. A team led by Dr. Davangere Devanand at C...