Hyposmia and anosmia are among the main symptoms of many otorhinolaryngological and neurological diseases. Nevertheless, there are no data on the prevalence of these pathologies in Russia.

OBJECTIVE

To study the incidence of olfactory disorders among the population of the Russian Federation with the use of «Olfactory dysfunction questionnaire».

PATIENTS AND METHODS

We used the adapted «Olfactory dysfunction questionnaire», which has passed the full validation and reliability assessment on the Russian sample and is a single-scale method of express diagnosis of the olfaction level consisting of 11 questions. The study involved 1529 people aged 15—74 years living in 71 constituent entities of the Russian Federation.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

It has been found that approximately 74% of Russian residents have normal olfaction, 25% — hyposmia, and anosmia is identified in about 1% of the population according to the diagnosis results. Along with this, 77% of patients with hyposmia suffer from a mild olfactory dysfunction, 19% — from moderate hyposmia and 4% — from severe.

CONCLUSION

The number of persons in the Russian Federation with hyposmia was 36 142 thous., and with anosmia — 1249 thous. considering the population of the Russian Federation on January 1, 2023. There were no significant differences in the olfaction level depending on the region of residence.