Assessing olfaction following pediatric traumatic brain injury

A brief procedure for screening the olfactory function in elementary-age children was developed in the present investigation When the performance of pediatric patients with mild traumatic brain injury (TBI) was compared with that of a matched sample with severe TBI, the severe TBI sample was one and one-half times as likely to exhibit an impaired sense of smell of formal testing (p<0 05) Subsequent analyses demonstrated that patients with olfactory deficits were three times as likely to manifest executive dysfunction as reported by their parents on a behavior rating scale In contrast to formal testing, individual interview revealed that TBI subjects and their parents were seldom aware of olfactory deficits Thus, formal testing of olfaction following pediatric head trauma should not be deferred.