Long-term recovery of taste and smell following acute COVID-19 infection in a New Jersey cohort

Loss of taste and smell is one of the most troubling symptoms of long COVID and may be permanent for some. Correlation between subjectively and objectively assessed olfactory and gustatory impairment is low, leading to uncertainty about how many people are affected, how many recover, and to what extent. We prospectively investigated the effects of COVID-19 on long-term chemosensory function in a university and hospital-based cohort in NJ. We followed 856 participants from March 2020 through April 2022, of which 58 were diagnosed with COVID-19 and completed the NHANES 2013–2014 taste and smell protocol, including a chemosensory questionnaire, whole-mouth taste tests, and an 8-item odor identification test at and/or before acute COVID-19 infection. Of these, 29 repeated taste and smell assessments at 6 months (183.0 ± 54.6) follow-up. Total overall smell score significantly improved from baseline to 6-month follow up (6.9 ± 1.4 vs 7.6 ± 0.8; p = .01). Taste intensity also improved across 6 months, but not significantly. Our study is the first to show psychophysically-assessed and self-reported long-term recovery of olfactory and gustatory function in the same population after acute COVID-19.