as the saying goes, "the nose smells fragrant and the tongue tastes five flavors". The information of five flavors, sour, sweet, bitter, spicy and salty, is transmitted by tiny nipples on the tongue surface, which are called taste cells of tongue buds, and then excited by the taste center of cerebral cortex, and the whole taste analysis activity is completed by the feedback loop neurohumoral system. However, some people will have a strange smell in their mouths when they eat, or they will feel abnormal taste in their mouths when they don't eat. This often suggests that you may have some kind of disease. (1) Bitter taste means bitter taste in the mouth. It is more common in acute inflammation, mainly liver and gallbladder inflammation, which is often related to bile metabolism. Bitter mouth can also be seen in cancer. Dr. Devis, an American medical scientist, also found that cancer patients lose their taste for sweet food, but their feeling of bitter food is increasing day by day, which is related to the disorder of blood circulation in patients' tongue and the change of saliva components. Traditional Chinese medicine believes that people with bitter taste often have symptoms such as headache, dizziness, red face, impatience and irritability, dry stool, reddish tongue, thin yellow fur and thready pulse, which are mostly caused by heat in liver and gallbladder. Bitter mouth, often accompanied by cold and heat exchanges, upset and vomiting, full chest and hypochondrium, silent appetite, red and yellow urine and other symptoms, mostly caused by gallbladder heat steaming up. (2) Sweet mouth is sweet, which means that there is sweetness in the mouth, also known as "sweet mouth". At this time, even drinking boiled water is sweet, or sweet and sour. Sweet taste is common in patients with digestive system dysfunction or diabetes. The former is caused by abnormal secretion of various digestive enzymes due to digestive system dysfunction, especially the increase of amylase content in saliva, which makes them feel sweet, while the latter feels sweet because of the increase of blood sugar and sugar in saliva. Traditional Chinese medicine believes that sweetness is mostly caused by dysfunction of the spleen and stomach. Clinically, it can be divided into two ways: steaming the sweet taste with spleen and stomach heat and worrying about the sweet taste with spleen and stomach qi and yin. The former is mostly caused by overeating spicy and thick products, breeding internal heat or exogenous pathogenic heat accumulated in the spleen and stomach, which is characterized by sweet taste and thirst, liking drinking water, eating too much and being prone to hunger, or sores on the lips and tongue, dry stool, dry tongue coating and strong pulse. The latter is mostly caused by the injury of spleen and stomach caused by old age or long-term illness, which leads to the injury of both qi and yin, endogenous deficiency and heat, and burning of spleen and body fluid. It is characterized by sweet mouth and dry mouth, lack of drinking water, shortness of breath, tiredness, no appetite, abdominal distension in Anhui, and soft stool. (3) Salty mouth, that is, conscious of salty taste in the mouth, just like salt particles in the mouth, is more common in chronic pharyngitis, chronic nephritis, neurosis or oral ulcer. Chinese medicine believes that salty mouth is mostly caused by kidney deficiency. If accompanied by symptoms such as soreness of the waist and knees, dizziness and tinnitus, feverish sensation in the five senses, night sweats, nocturnal emission, scanty fur, and thready pulse, it belongs to deficiency of kidney yin and inflammation due to deficiency of fire, which is called "kidney yin deficiency and salty mouth"; If you have symptoms such as chills, cold limbs, fatigue, frequent nocturnal urination, impotence with leukorrhagia, fat tongue and deep pulse, it belongs to kidney yang deficiency and excellent kidney fluid, which is called "kidney yang is salty in the tiger's mouth". (4) Sour mouth is a conscious sour taste in the mouth, which is more common in gastritis and gastric and duodenal ulcers. Traditional Chinese medicine believes that sour mouth is mostly caused by the invasion of spleen by the heat of liver and gallbladder, often accompanied by symptoms such as chest tightness, hypochondriac pain, nausea, abdominal distension after eating, thin yellow tongue coating, and thready pulse. (5) Bitterness means that there is a sense of spicy taste in the mouth or spicy feeling in the tongue. Common in hypertension, neurosis, menopausal syndrome and long-term low fever. Because spicy taste is a comprehensive feeling of salty taste, heat sensation and pain, the tongue temperature of patients who feel spicy mouth may be on the high side, and the tongue mucosa of patients with spicy mouth is lucky to have dumplings. Eh, times? Stabilize the account. 5. What is the posture of the rich? What is the basis of the 31-year-old zinc bath and prayer? (6) Pale mouth, which means that the taste in the mouth is delayed, and the mouth is faint consciously, so it is impossible to taste the taste of food. It is more common in the initial or fading period of inflammation, and enteritis, dysentery and other digestive system diseases are more common, and it is also seen in the recovery stage after major surgery; Patients with endocrine diseases, consumptive diseases with long-term fever, malnutrition, deficiency of vitamins and trace element zinc, protein and insufficient calorie intake often have a light taste, because such diseases can reduce the sensitivity of tongue taste buds and cause tasteless taste. In addition, the taste is dull and tasteless, and the taste is weakened or even disappeared, which is one of the characteristics of cancer patients. Therefore, middle-aged and elderly people should be highly alert to the possibility of cancer when their taste suddenly weakens or disappears for unknown reasons. Of course, this should be distinguished from the situation that the taste buds of the elderly are degraded, the teeth are incomplete (even if dentures are installed, the jaws are atrophied to varying degrees), so that chewing is insufficient, even swallowing, and food can not be fully contacted with the taste buds, resulting in food ignorance. Traditional Chinese medicine believes that tasteless taste and bad diet are mostly due to weakness of the spleen and stomach after illness and loss of health in transportation. Often accompanied by loss of appetite, weakness of limbs, fullness in chest and Anhui, pale tongue with white fur and other symptoms. (7) Mouth astringency, which means that there is a astringent taste in the mouth, which is common in neurosis or those who have not slept all night. Generally, as long as the sleep time is adjusted, the mouth astringency can be eliminated with some sedatives when necessary. However, it should be noted that some malignant tumors, especially in the advanced stage, have bitter taste. (8) Mouth-to-mouth fragrance means that there is a fragrance in the mouth consciously, such as the fragrance of fruit, which is more common in severe diabetes (diabetes). You should go to the hospital immediately for examination, definite diagnosis and treatment. To sum up, we can identify and observe health through the window of taste. However, when analyzing the relationship between abnormal taste and diseases, we must also pay attention to the following two points: First, abnormal taste is related to age, gender, mood, temperature and other factors, and only after these factors are excluded can it be related to diseases. For example, the sensitivity of taste varies from person to person, children are stronger than adults, young people are stronger than the elderly, and women are stronger than men; The same person, the evening is better than the morning. Emotion is also related to taste. When you are angry, afraid, anxious, sad, or tired, your taste will decrease. Hunger for a long time will make the sense of taste temporarily out of order, and the sense of taste of food will be poor; Temperature also affects taste, and people's taste sensitivity is the highest between 21-31℃. In addition, smoking or excessive drinking, lack of sleep, etc., can also lead to abnormal taste. Second, abnormal taste is sometimes related to poor oral hygiene or taste buds being temporarily affected by external substances. These are not within the scope of taste variation. For example, some toothpastes contain sodium dodecyl sulfate, which can make the sour taste in orange juice taste sweet. Tetracycline tablets can be chewed and swallowed, and the bitter taste on the tongue surface can be changed into metallic taste for a period of time, which can not be removed even by gargling with water and scraping the tongue coating. What diseases will hinder the taste of the elderly? ? There is a taste bud structure on human tongue, which can taste sweet, sour, bitter, salty and spicy. Some oral diseases, such as oral lichen planus, thrush and recurrent aphtha, produce a series of symptoms such as pain and itching, which not only affect eating, but also hinder taste. ? However, the most obvious obstacle to the taste of the elderly is not the oral disease itself, but the systemic disease, because the systemic disease will cause various changes in the tongue coating, and the thick and greasy tongue coating, peeling and other changes are closely related to the taste. For example, some infectious or dyspeptic diseases, the tongue coating is generally thick; some chronic consumptive diseases, such as tumors, anemia, tuberculosis, etc., the thin tongue coating will affect the taste. ? The taste bud function of the elderly has begun to decline, so it is more obviously affected by the disease; Once the taste disorder occurs, we should look for the reasons from two aspects of systemic oral diseases. Why do you feel sweet, sour, bitter and salty after eating healthily from the taste? It all depends on the effect of the tongue, the taste organ. The taste buds on the tongue surface can feel various chemical stimuli in the mouth. When the soluble odorous substances of food come into contact with the taste buds, the cell cilia in the taste buds transmit sensory information to the cerebral cortex center, thus producing taste. If the taste is abnormal, it may be a signal of hidden diseases in the body. When faced with delicious food, I feel indifferent and have a poor appetite. The reason may be exogenous discomfort, or spleen and stomach weakness, poor transport, so that you don't think about eating. At this time, spleen and qi should be strengthened. I feel sour in my mouth even if I don't eat acidic food. This situation is caused by disharmony between liver and stomach or stagnation of fire in liver. Patients may have gastritis or peptic ulcer, so that gastric acid is more than normal. Bitter mouth The only organ in the human body that can produce bitter taste is the gallbladder. If you feel bitter mouth, that is, there is something wrong with the liver and gallbladder, which is usually caused by heat in the liver and gallbladder. "Ling Shu Si Shi Qi": "Bile fluid drainage leads to bitter taste". If you eat hot and dry food often, it will lead to the rise of liver fire and burn body fluids, so you feel bitter. People who often stay up late or smoke will feel bitter when they wake up in the morning. There is often sweetness in the mouth, which is mostly caused by damp heat accumulated in the spleen. In addition, the digestive system is dysfunctional, disturbing all kinds of secretion, increasing the starch content in saliva, stimulating the tongue and causing taste buds, thus feeling sweet. Diabetics also feel sweet, because the blood sugar in the body increases and the sugar in saliva increases, so it is sweet. Salty mouth mostly belongs to kidney deficiency, which is caused by flooding of renal fluid. Abnormal taste and diseases (article source: (Chen Jipei)) Abnormal taste is a kind of information indicating diseases, which should attract the attention of doctors and patients themselves. △ Bitter mouth: Clinical observation shows that bitter mouth is more common in hepatobiliary heat syndrome and gastrointestinal heat syndrome; In modern medicine, most of them are manifestations of acute inflammation, and most of them are hepatobiliary diseases. This may be caused by abnormal bile excretion. Cancer patients will feel bitter when they eat sweet things because of the increase of sweetness threshold and the decrease of bitterness threshold. △ Pale mouth: Pale mouth is more common in patients with spleen and stomach deficiency and cold after long-term illness. After major surgery, patients will feel dull and tasteless when they lose appetite. Pale mouth also often appears in inflammatory infection, but it is mostly in the initial stage of the disease or in the stage of regression. The former is the manifestation of light evil, while the latter is the image of deficiency of evil, and its significance is obviously different from that of bitter mouth. Digestive system diseases such as enteritis and dysentery often have a pale mouth, and the syndrome differentiation mostly belongs to gastrointestinal dampness or cold pathogen. Although it is empirical, it should be noted that bitter and cold drugs should not be used. Clinical tests show that patients with severe oral weakness are not sensitive to sweet, sour, bitter and salty tastes, and the taste threshold generally rises. △ Sweet mouth: Patients with excess heat in spleen and stomach, damp-heat stagnation, and phlegm-fire in liver and spleen may feel sweet, which was called "spleen heat and sweet mouth" by the ancients. Studies have proved that the dysfunction of digestive system can cause abnormal secretion of various enzymes, increase the content of amylase in saliva, stimulate the taste buds on the tongue and feel sweet. Diabetes patients have higher blood sugar and higher sugar in saliva, so they often feel that their mouths are sweet. △ Mouth astringency: When the bitterness threshold of tongue taste cells decreases and the tactile sensation of tongue is abnormal, mouth astringency may occur. Patients with liver and gallbladder stagnation and yin injury or spleen soil decline often feel dry or dry and tasteless. After severe neurosis or sleepless nights, the secretion of salivary glands decreases, and you can also feel dull and astringent. All kinds of cancer have bitter taste in the later stage, which is considered by Chinese medicine to be the decline of spleen and kidney and the stagnation of qi and blood. △ Sour mouth: Chinese medicine believes that "liver heat leads to sour mouth" and "spleen and stomach qi are weak, and wood takes advantage of soil position and sour mouth", so sour mouth is mostly caused by spleen deficiency and liver fire, which is common in gastritis and peptic ulcer and related to hyperacidity. Some people measured the saliva of patients with oral acid, in which the contents of lactic acid, phosphatase and carbonic anhydrase were higher than those of normal people, and the PH was more acidic. △ salty mouth: salty mouth is mostly due to spleen deficiency and dampness, and kidney deficiency and fire. Because Chinese medicine believes that "salty is kidney flavor", it is common in patients with neurosis and acute attack of chronic pharyngitis due to deficiency of kidney yin and rising of kidney fire. Sometimes when the saliva of patients with salty mouth is measured, it can be seen that the chloride content of sodium, potassium, calcium and magnesium increases, and the PH tends to be weakly alkaline. △ Bitterness: Bitterness is a combination of salty taste, heat sensation and pain. Deficiency of kidney yin and hyperactivity of liver fire are the most common syndromes in TCM, followed by lung deficiency and phlegm heat. It is often seen in patients with hypertension, neurosis and menopausal syndrome. According to the measurement, at room temperature of 18℃-22℃, the tongue temperature of normal people is mostly 33℃-35℃, and the tongue temperature of patients with spicy mouth is on the high side, sometimes reaching above 36℃. In addition, the tongue mucosa of patients with spicy mouth is sensitive to salty taste and pain. Taste: The "alarm" signals of diseases are sweet, sour, bitter, spicy and salty, which constitute different taste senses. Interestingly, people's taste perception varies greatly. In 1932, American scientist Dr. Arthur Fokrone and his assistant Noelle prepared an organic compound called phenylthiourea in the experiment. Noelle can't stand the bitter taste of this compound, but Fox is indifferent. The two men argued endlessly about it. It turns out that they have completely different tastes for bitterness. People's taste will also be disturbed and deceived by external influences. For example, eating the same can of pork on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau is more delicious than eating it on the seashore of Qingdao, because the taste is most sensitive under low pressure. In the tropical forests of western Africa and Hainan Island in China, there is a plant called "mysterious fruit". As long as you taste a little of this pulp, within 4 hours, no matter whether you eat sour or bitter, your mouth is always sweet. However, another plant, Gymnema sylvestre, will not feel sweet at all even if it eats honey again within 24 hours after tasting its leaves. With people's attention and research on taste, many amazing research results have been obtained. Among patients with diabetes, thyroid tumors and glaucoma, taste blindness is many times higher than that of normal people. Therefore, scientists believe that taste disorder may be a "warning" of suffering from a certain disease. Recently, Du Huowo, director of the Department of Oncology at Northwestern University in the United States, pointed out after the experiment that it is possible to screen whether a patient has cancer at an early stage within a few minutes according to his reaction to taste by dropping a few drops of diluent of taste stimulator on his tongue. Cancer research experts in many countries have found that a considerable number of early cancer patients will have a weakened sense of taste. About 1/4 of late cancer patients' sudden weight loss is related to abnormal taste, which will lead to anorexia. Therefore, anorexia caused by the disappearance of taste is probably one of the signs of illness. However, older people have different tastes from young people. Young people think delicious things, while old people think bitter and sour. This is because people's taste buds that are sweet and salty shrink first, while those that feel bitter and sour live much longer. Therefore, the elderly should not suspect that they have cancer when their mouths are bitter and sour. Beware of fast food syndrome In recent years, fast food, such as hamburgers, sandwiches and instant noodles, has occupied a large number of markets, and it has been welcomed by people because of its quickness and convenience. What's more, some people eat instant noodles or go to fast food restaurants every day for convenience and time saving. After a long time, a disease called "fast food syndrome" is born, and its symptom is abnormal taste. Usually, there are several reasons for abnormal taste: the side effects caused by long-term use of drugs to treat rheumatism; Visceral diseases such as kidney or liver; Physiological taste loss caused by old age; Impairment of taste nerves caused by otitis media and other operations. Abnormal taste caused by diet first appeared in Japan. In recent years, with the popularization of fast food diet, the number of patients in China is increasing. The symptoms of this abnormal taste are: I don't know the original taste of the food I eat, I only feel sweet no matter what, I feel bitter in my mouth when I don't eat anything, and my tongue has a burning feeling. If we know the diet of these patients, almost all of them are partial to food or try to save time and eat too much fast food commentary or instant noodles. Abnormal taste caused by diet does not show up quickly, but slowly appears in my ignorance, so it is generally not paid much attention to.