Taste sensation in patients with cancer has previously been studied with the cumbersome method of chemical gustometry, which have produced inconsistent results. In this study taste thresholds were determined with the simple and reliable technique of electrogustometry in 51 patients with cancers of the lung (small cell), ovary or breast, and in 29 matched control patients with nonneoplastic disease. Chemical smell thresholds for phenyl‐methyl‐ethyl‐carbinol were studied in the same group of patients. Electrical taste threshold was higher in patients with cancer compared with control patients (30 [12 to 80] μA versus 9.5 [6.1 to 24] μA; median [interquartile range], P < 0.001). No differences were seen in smell thresholds. Patients who responded to chemotherapy obtained a decreased electrogustometric threshold at time of reevaluation (24 [8 to 64] μA versus 30 [15 to 90] μA; median [interquartile range], P < 0.05). These results suggest an effect of the malignant disease itself on taste thresholds. Cancer 68:2260–2265, 1991.

Recognition thresholds for the four basic tastes (salt, sour, sweet and bitter) were tested by the forced-choice technique in 27 patients with small-cell lung cancer, and 22 weight-matched control patients with non-malignant diseases. No significant differences in threshold concentrations could be demonstrated. When patients who were losing weight were compared with weight-stable patients, significantly lower taste thresholds for bitter substances were found in weight losing groups in both cancer and control patients. Small-cell lung cancer patients who responded to therapy had obtained an increased threshold for bitter taste at the time of reevaluation than at the time of diagnosis, an effect that may be explained by the chemotherapeutic regimen. The results suggest that in patients with small-cell lung cancer it is not the cancer disease per se but the weight loss that often accompanies it that causes an increased taste sensitivity for bitter substances.

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