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The amazing woman who can smell Parkinson’s disease — before symptoms appear
The Washington Post ^ | 23 Oct 2015 | Yanan Wang

Posted on 10/26/2015 9:42:41 AM PDT by Theoria

Joy Milne has always had a keen sense of smell, so she was unfazed when her husband, Les, began emitting a subtle musky odor.

He was an anesthesiologist who worked long hours, and Milne assumed the smell was just sweat. But with the change in scent came a growing tiredness that was explained by a devastating diagnosis six years later: Les had Parkinson’s disease.

“I could always smell things other people couldn’t smell,” Milne said during a BBC broadcast Thursday. After attending a meeting for the charity Parkinson’s UK, where the other Parkinson’s patients shared her husband’s musky scent, she realized that the odor might be tied to the condition.

After the 65-year-old Perth woman off-handedly mentioned this observation to a few scientists, they decided to investigate.

Researchers at the University of Edinburgh gave T-shirts to six people with Parkinson’s and six people without the disease. After the subjects wore the shirts, they were passed on to Milne, who then had to determine by smell whether each wearer had Parkinson’s.

Her diagnoses were eerily accurate — and have potentially groundbreaking implications for people living with the disease.

Milne made correct assessments for 11 out of the 12 cases. In the one case she got “wrong,” she insisted that a T-shirt worn by a member of the control group had the warning scent.

Eight months after the study was conducted, she was proven right, bringing her accuracy rate up to one hundred. The supposedly healthy individual contacted one of the doctors and informed him that he had, in fact, just been diagnosed with Parkinson’s.

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...


TOPICS: Health/Medicine; Science
KEYWORDS: districtofcolumbia; joymilne; parkinson; parkinsondisease; smell; smellparkinsons; washingtoncompost; washingtonpost; yananwang
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To: Theoria

My mother-in-law’s little rescue mutt can tell (smell, I presume) when her blood glucose level is wrong (too high or too low). I think he has saved her life a few times.


21 posted on 10/26/2015 10:20:41 AM PDT by NorthMountain ("The time has come", the Walrus said, "to talk of many things")
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To: PGR88

Must be what is like to be a dog. They just have to look at people and say “really? You can’t smell that?”


22 posted on 10/26/2015 10:21:32 AM PDT by glorgau
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To: Theoria

I knew a doctor with Parkinson’s, and a good friend, now, who went through several t-shirts a day with massive musky sweating and apparently discolored the t shirts with their increased sweating.

Good doctors for centuries have relied on their olfactory senses, to go with their visual and auditory senses. They use all of their senses to make a diagnosis along with using their stethoscope and touch and feeling their patients.

So a non MD person with excellent olfactory sense might be able to sense this terrible disease and others.


23 posted on 10/26/2015 10:22:16 AM PDT by Grampa Dave ("If you use FR and don't donate. It is my personal view that you are a Left Wing or Rino plant.")
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To: Lazamataz

too bad his parkinsons was brought on by years of cocaine abuse.


24 posted on 10/26/2015 10:31:01 AM PDT by longfellow (Bill Maher, the 21st hijacker.)
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To: Theoria
we had a co worker about 10 yrs ago begin emitting almost a spicey smelly akin to middle eastern food...it continued and got worse over time....she ended up with breast cancer...once it cured, the odor stopped.

I had a close friend, who had parkinsons - he smelled "off" as well. It is not such a far fetched concept.....we perspire normally - if our chemicals are "off" or out of whack - it makes sense that tainted sweat would follow

except my wife, she always smells of lilacs

25 posted on 10/26/2015 10:37:24 AM PDT by Revelation 911
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To: Anitius Severinus Boethius

What Causes Parkinson’s Disease?

A Shortage of Dopamine

Parkinson’s disease occurs when nerve cells, or neurons, in an area of the brain that controls movement become impaired and/or die. Normally, these neurons produce an important brain chemical known as dopamine, but when the neurons die or become impaired, they produce less dopamine. This shortage of dopamine causes the movement problems of people with Parkinson’s.

Dopamine is a chemical messenger, or neurotransmitter. Dopamine is responsible for transmitting signals between the substantia nigra and multiple brain regions. The connection between the substantia nigra and the corpus striatum is critical to produce smooth, purposeful movement. Loss of dopamine in this circuit results in abnormal nerve-firing patterns within the brain that cause impaired movement.

Loss of Norepinephrine

People with Parkinson’s also have loss of the nerve endings that produce the neurotransmitter norepinephrine. Norepinephrine, which is closely related to dopamine, is the main chemical messenger of the sympathetic nervous system. The sympathetic nervous system controls many automatic functions of the body, such as heart rate and blood pressure. The loss of norepinephrine might help explain several of the non-movement features of Parkinson’s, such as fatigue, irregular blood pressure, decreased gastric motility or movement of food through the digestive tract, and postural hypotension. Postural hypotension is a sudden drop in blood pressure when a person stands up from a sitting or lying-down position. It may cause dizziness, lightheadedness, and in some cases, loss of balance or fainting.

http://nihseniorhealth.gov/parkinsonsdisease/whatcausesparkinsonsdisease/01.html


26 posted on 10/26/2015 10:37:40 AM PDT by Grampa Dave ("If you use FR and don't donate. It is my personal view that you are a Left Wing or Rino plant.")
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To: Theoria

A recent ‘Castle’ TV show had a woman who had a heightened sense of smell. She was called ‘the Nose’. Glad some people have this gift. Probably glad I don’t. The women in the show was tormented by any unusual scent. Very uncomfortable to watch.


27 posted on 10/26/2015 10:44:32 AM PDT by originalbuckeye ("In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act." - George Orwell)
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To: Theoria

I think I am losing my sense of smell. I have to check out my dogs real close to tell when they need a bath.

Strong perfume still gives me a headache and I can smell cigarette smoke a block away, almost. Other smells, even good smelling food is getting less.


28 posted on 10/26/2015 11:01:42 AM PDT by Ditter (God Bless Texas!)
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To: Anitius Severinus Boethius

My bet is that it’s all leading back to sweat pores and the manufacture of sweat being in a state of change.


29 posted on 10/26/2015 11:04:54 AM PDT by pepsionice
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To: Timocrat

“If she can do this I bet you could train a Labrador to do exactly the same thing.”

Somebody will start a business training dogs to detect illnesses. No doubt about it that such will be more accurate than many ‘modern’ medical testing procedures. Though it seems foul, the odor urine puts off can probably be even more indicative of certain diseases, since urine, like sweat, is another way the body passes toxins. A million bucks start up cash would go a loooong way in setting up such a life saving business.


30 posted on 10/26/2015 11:10:23 AM PDT by Carthego delenda est
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To: Timocrat
If she can do this I bet you could train a Labrador to do exactly the same thing.
Seems obvious that a dog which can be trained to sniff out bombs might be similarly effective in this application.

That doesn’t answer to the research issue of chemical composition being detected, but it would seem that diagnostic purposes would be answered by trained dogs.


31 posted on 10/26/2015 11:13:11 AM PDT by conservatism_IS_compassion ('Liberalism' is a conspiracy against the public by wire-service journalism.)
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To: Carthego delenda est
Somebody will start a business training dogs to detect illnesses. No doubt about it that such will be more accurate than many ‘modern’ medical testing procedures. Though it seems foul, the odor urine puts off can probably be even more indicative of certain diseases, since urine, like sweat, is another way the body passes toxins. A million bucks start up cash would go a loooong way in setting up such a life saving business.

They are already training dogs to detect cancer in patients by smell...

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/aug/08/cancer-detecting-dogs-nhs-trial-milton-keynes-prostate

32 posted on 10/26/2015 11:15:06 AM PDT by CA Conservative (Texan by birth, Californian by circumstance)
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To: Theoria

Husband was taking some sort of drug, for ulcerative
colitis I think. It was made from horse urine; and
the horseflies would chase him and sting him. It
left big welts and was painful.


33 posted on 10/26/2015 11:17:04 AM PDT by Twinkie (JOHN 3:16)
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To: Theoria

I don’t know what causes parkinsons smell, but old people smell is thought to be caused by a chemical called 2-nonenal


34 posted on 10/26/2015 11:19:52 AM PDT by mjp ((pro-{God, reality, reason, egoism, individualism, natural rights, limited government, capitalism}))
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To: Anitius Severinus Boethius

There have been some studies suggesting that Heliobacter pylori, the bacteria that cause ulcers, may play a role in Parkinson’s disease.

Parkinson’s patients seem to suffer from high rates of constipation, before developing the other neurological symptoms.

I wonder if the musty odor would show up in people affected by H pylori, or is it something that only shows up after the brain begins to be affected.


35 posted on 10/26/2015 11:44:10 AM PDT by heartwood
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To: mjp

I am “cursed” with an excellent sense of smell. It really is no fun. It has been handy a few times. I detected an electrical fire at work long before anyone else could smell it. All in all though it is a pain. Perfume, body odor, bad breathe etc. are really a problem.


36 posted on 10/26/2015 11:48:14 AM PDT by Himyar (Sessions: the only real man in D.C.)
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To: Timocrat
I bet you could train a Labrador to do exactly the same thing.

Of course you could, once you knew what to look for. She provided that initial piece of info.

37 posted on 10/26/2015 11:51:25 AM PDT by Pearls Before Swine
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To: Revelation 911

Were you the only one who noticed the smell?


38 posted on 10/26/2015 11:58:22 AM PDT by huldah1776
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To: Himyar
I am “cursed” with an excellent sense of smell.

I'm just the opposite. I have a poor sense of smell. I can only faintly detect the odors of a few things, like the sea air, cooking meat, perfume/flowers, and oddly enough, gasoline and ammonia. That's about it.

There are some things I would like to be able to smell, like smoke, natural gas, etc.

39 posted on 10/26/2015 1:10:28 PM PDT by Ol' Dan Tucker (...and he shall magnify himself in his heart, and by peace shall destroy many... Daniel 8:25)
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To: Anitius Severinus Boethius

Excellent point!


40 posted on 10/26/2015 1:29:51 PM PDT by doberville
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