Ask the Doctor (2017–…): Season 1, Episode 11 - Senses - full transcript

[Shalin] From a spectacular sunset
to an intoxicating fragrance,

and a loved one's embrace.

Not only do our senses help us
experience the world around us,

but they can also help us survive.

In this episode,
we explore some of our basic senses,

and their vital role in our
health and wellbeing.

Sight, smell, touch, hearing.

We often take them for granted.

[woman] That's good.

[Shalin] But there are simple ways
we can protect them.

- Don't clean your ears?
- No, you need earwax.



[Shalin] We have a simple demonstration
you can do at home to test your hearing.

High five. [laughs]

Sandro busts some myths about eyesight.

[Sandro] Carrots helping us
see in the dark

was British propaganda
to fool the Germans in World War II.

Eugh!

[Shalin] And Renee explores the vital link
between memory and our sense of smell.

[Olivier] People who start losing
their sense of smell

are at a higher risk of developing
brain disorders like Alzheimer's disease.

[theme music]

[Renee] Have you ever wondered

why your nose is right smack-bang
in the centre of your face?

Well, other than acting as
a cleaning filter,

it leads to the olfactory bulb,



a hub of nerve cells
transmitting smell information

from the nose to the brain.

And our ability to smell, or not,

can actually tell us a lot
about our health.

In fact,
there are a number of good reasons

why we shouldn't take our
sniffing powers for granted.

Someone with fascinating insights
into the power of smell

is Professor Olivier Piguet,

a clinical neuropsychologist
who specialises in neurodegeneration.

He also likes to rock'n'roll.

I thought I would test you
with a few things to smell.

Oh, I haven't done a test in a while.
[laughs]

That's why we're at a florist's.

We're here for a fun demo
to check my sense of smell.

Here's the first one.

I'm smelling vanilla and mint, I think.

- It's a lolly of some kind.
- Yes.

[Renee laughs]
[Olivier] OK, good.

- Oh, oranges. Yep. I know that one.
- Orange, yes.

[Renee] I love oranges.

- Oh, that smells like rose.
- Mmm. Very nice.

And big smell.

[sniffs] Eugh! [clears throat]

- Was that raw fish? Can I open my eyes?
- Well done. Yes. Four out of four.

[laughs]

Unlike our other senses,
there is no diagnostic test

that can accurately measure
how good our sense of smell is,

because the experience of smell
is subjective.

Oh, my gosh,
let's just move the fish away.

Although a loss of smell
can be temporarily caused

by the common cold, for example,

in some cases, it may be a symptom
of a more serious health condition.

[Olivier] There have been studies showing

that people who start losing
their sense of smell

are at a higher risk of developing
brain disorders

like dementia and Alzheimer's disease.

[Renee] If the link between
the loss of smell

and the development of Alzheimer's
and dementia is proven,

it will significantly contribute
to the understanding and treatment

of these diseases.

So, we need to find tests
that will help identify individuals

who are going on to develop dementia

so that we can then have interventions,

drugs, when they become
more available on the market.

So a smell test
is one of these things we can use.

[Renee] But there's another reason
why smell is vital.

When it triggers our memory,

we recall that past experience
in more vivid detail.

So, for example,
you walk somewhere in the street

and there's a smell of flowers,
for example,

and it takes you back to very old
personal memories of your childhood.

So that's one type of memory.

[Renee] Another type of memory triggered
by smell gives us a survival advantage.

If you're able to make a strong
emotional connection to bad food,

you're able to react more quickly
to its bad smell

and minimise the risk of poisoning
by avoiding it in future.

Positively, you see that, for example,
in babies, just the newborns,

there is a smell of their mother,

and that is something
that is very powerful.

And there's this experience even in
two- or three-day-old babies,

you can take two pieces of cloth,

one that the mother has been wearing
under her armpit for a few minutes

and a neutral one,

and the babies consistently
will turn towards the cloth

that her mother has put under her arm.

Teenage years,
there's things happening in our bodies.

There's all these pheromones
and attractions to other individuals,

and it's also smell based.

It sounds like a lot of the memories
that are associated with smell

are actually quite emotional.
Would that be fair to say?

There is a very strong connection

between the smell centre
and the memory centre,

via this third region, the amygdala.

The amygdala is the emotion centre
of the brain,

and the amygdala is really sitting
on top of the memory centre.

So the information from the smell centre
travels very quickly to the emotion centre

and then to the memory centre.

So it's almost like they live
kind of next door to each other,

as opposed to having to travel
from the country to the city.

That's right. That's a very good analogy,

and together,
they make very powerful memories.

The smell of chlorine always take me back
to my summer days

of my childhood in Perth.

Swimming in the pool,
or having to clean it.

It's amazing how smell can
make your memories so vivid.

But what happens if you don't have
any conscious memory of something?

Do smells still work?

- Hello!
- Hello, Leah.

- How are you, darling?
- Good.

[Renee] My friend Leah suffers from
almost total memory loss.

She attributes this to ECT,
electro-convulsive therapy,

which she underwent to treat
her severe depression,

although there is no clinical evidence
to support this.

So, what part of your life
do you not remember?

I'm 39 now, so anything below 30.

Yeah, right. And how does that feel?

Oh, it's fine. I'm used to it.

I don't know any better,
so it can be fun at times.

It can be a good excuse
to get out of things at times.

- Yeah.
- I don't have an issue with it.

[Renee] But thanks to
her sense of smell,

Leah has found a way to reboot memories
she thought were lost to her forever.

It's kind of exciting,
so, I think the first one,

I was in a showroom, a car showroom.

We were looking to buy a new car,
my husband and I.

And just the smells.

I think it was the combination of the
fresh paint, paint protection, leather.

And all of a sudden, I just flashed back
to guys I'd dated when I was young.

- Real naughty guys, bad guys.
[Renee] Yeah. [laughs]

And then lavender.

It's quite strange.
It has to be freshly picked.

It's cute,
'cause it reminds of my grandma,

and she used to make us,
when we were little,

pouches with fresh lavender
to stick in our school uniforms

before we went to school.
So it's actually a really nice memory.

The first time I opened
tinned spaghetti,

I smelt it with a jaffle somewhere,

and then straight away
thought of my little brother,

and rang my mum and asked, kind of,
"How come?" and she'd say,

"Oh, you cooked that for your brother
all the time after school,

when you looked after him."

And I know about your hairspray one.

Yeah, that's... You were there.

So, there's a certain type of brand
we used.

I used to work in television, in film,
doing hair and make-up.

And I sprayed it,
I hadn't sprayed it in a long time,

and that kind of gave me memories
back at Channel 7,

certain people I worked with.

[Renee] So,
are those memories really vivid,

or do they sort of seem a bit vague?

- The emotions are more vivid...
[Renee] Yeah.

...than the actual memories.
They can be vague.

But I always verify them
and check that they're real.

[Renee laughs]
- So they are real.

So really, it's the emotions, isn't it,

not so much sort of the visual
or the physical?

If I break it down,
it's emotions, definitely.

- Yeah, yeah.
- But I can have visuals,

but they're just vague.

[Renee] While she's enjoying
reclaiming memories,

these days, as a new mum,

Leah's focus is creating new memories
for the future.

Mainly this one.
So, obviously he smells like him

and there's so many smells that
I'll associate with him forever.

There'll be the foods that he loves,
in particular, like, cucumbers.

[Renee] Really? He loves cucumbers?

[Leah] Yeah, baby cucumbers,
one in each hand.

They're the best snack.

And I think more will pop up
as time goes on,

and certainly now that
I'm more aware of it.

[baby gurgles]
[Renee] Yeah!

[Leah] This is a good game.
[Renee] Good job!

[Renee] We take our sense
of smell for granted,

until we lose it,

and like many of our faculties,

it may start to decline
after the age of 60.

But we can take steps to look after it.

Start by throwing away the cigarettes.

As the most concentrated form of pollution
people are exposed to,

cigarettes damage the olfactory nerves.

Quitting helps restore
your sense of smell.

Get an annual flu shot.

Nasal mucus from a cold or flu diminishes
your sense of smell temporarily,

and we all know how unpleasant that is.

And if using some of the stronger
household cleaning

or industrial chemicals,

mask up.

The toxicity of these products can also
affect the lining of your nasal passage,

sometimes permanently,
depending on the chemical.

It's important to look after
our sense of smell.

Because it's linked to different aspects
of our memory,

it impacts on our mental wellbeing.

So, what smell evokes
your most powerful memory?

[Sandro] How many of us recognise
how conditioned we are

to reacting to visual cues?

Take a look at my expressions here
and determine my mood.

Joyful.

Bored.

Surprised.

Suspicious.

All emotional states
you just perceived at a glance.

So keeping our peepers in
good working order is a big deal,

and just as you easily identified
my moods,

you'll probably recognise some of these
commonly held beliefs about eye care, too.

Number 1, holding a book too close

or sitting right in front of the telly

can damage your eyes.

The good news here is,
this one is just a myth.

So if you like to read up close
or have the TV in your face,

you don't need to worry.

And if you are near-sighted,
it won't worsen your eyesight, either.

Number 2,

reading in the dark will hurt your eyes.

Think about this.

Electric lighting didn't become widespread
in homes until the 1930s,

almost 100 years after automated printing
made books widely available and cheap.

So reading in low light
won't hurt your eyes

any more than it did
readers in the old days,

although it may require
a bit more brain power,

which can itself be tiring.

Number 3,

eating carrots will give me
better eyesight.

Carrots helping us see in the dark
was a World War II attempt by the Brits

to fool the Germans into thinking
it was carrots

that gave John Cunningham,
the ace British fighter pilot,

his amazing strike rate.

It was pure propaganda

to cover the fact it was the Brits'
superior night vision radar technology

that was able to identify
and destroy Nazi planes.

They still don't know
if the Nazis bought into it,

but we certainly did.

And in part, it's true.

Carrots are full of beta-carotene,

which our bodies use to make vitamin A,

a critical compound for sight

that allows our eyes to convert light into
signals that are transmitted to the brain.

But while vitamin A deficiency can cause
vision problems including blindness,

if you have a healthy, well-balanced diet,

you probably have all the vitamin A
you need,

and eating more carrots unfortunately
won't improve vision issues

caused by age, diabetes or genetics.

So, by now you might be wondering

if there are any ways
to improve your eyesight.

There's evidence to suggest there is.

It's all about eating plenty
of fresh vegetables,

specifically leafy greens,

and it works something like this.

Our retinal cells
contain three organic pigments

that protect the eye
from damaging UV light,

kind of like internal sunglasses.

We get these pigments from food,
especially those green veggies,

and research has shown that eating plenty
of them could even improve your eyesight.

On that note, I want to remind you all
using non-verbal communication to...

eat...

more...

vegies!

Each of our five primary senses

offers a different way of collecting
information about our environment.

But it's our sense of touch

that gives us our means of
physically interacting with the world.

Hot, cold, smooth, rough,

sharp, dull, vibration, pressure,

position, movement and pain,

all sensations we experience
through touch.

It's all made possible
by the massive network

of sensory receptors
and nerves within our body.

But these sensory receptors
aren't evenly spread.

In fact, if we reproportion Gary's body

to reflect which parts deliver the most
sensory information to the brain,

the bits with the most nerves
will become much bigger.

His hands, feet,

eyes, nose,

ears and lips would look like this,

not to mention his...

While we're still learning a lot
about how touch works,

research has revealed some
interesting stuff about the sense.

For example, in sports,

teams and players
that touch each other more

have been shown to have improved
individual and team performance

over a season,
and more wins overall.

Also, women tend to have
a much better sense of touch than men.

This is because they usually have
smaller hands,

meaning the sensory receptors
are more densely bunched together.

While there is much to be learnt,

there's a growing body of evidence

highlighting the importance of touch
to our physical and emotional wellbeing.

Perhaps it's something to think about
next time you greet a friend.

[indistinct chatter]

[Shalin] My mates have teased me
for several years now

about my bad hearing
in noisy environments.

I think I might have some hearing damage

from years of playing in what some people
consider as noise in a rock band.

[rock music]

And it turns out that
age-related hearing loss

can start as young as 40 in some people.

That's me next year.

Should I be worried?

Who better to ask than audiologist and
speech pathologist Dr Chyrisse Heine,

at Melbourne's La Trobe University.

She also likes... travelling.

To see if being a wannabe rock star
in my youth

has affected my hearing,

Dr Chyrisse has set up a demonstration
for us.

We're going to have a bit of fun
listening to some sounds today.

[Shalin] I'll be comparing my hearing

to a group of people
younger and older than me.

Being the good sport he is,

Sandro has volunteered
his own flesh and blood.

Dr Sandro's mother, Lyn,
and grandmother, Betty.

Lyn is 65 years old,

and Betty, 94.

[Chyrisse] We do know that
as you get older,

your hearing might deteriorate.

It doesn't happen for everybody.

[Shalin] This isn't a formal hearing test,

but a guide to the impact of ageing
on our hearing that we can all do.

[Chyrisse] So, the older you get,
the harder hearing becomes,

and the younger you are,

you've probably got good hearing if you
haven't been to many loud concerts.

So, around 39, 40 we start getting
degeneration of the auditory pathways.

- That's me and you.
- [laughter]

High five. High five for hearing loss.

[laughter]

[Shalin] For this demo,
we're facing outwards from a speaker

that's positioned in the middle
of our little circle.

[Chyrisse] So,
you're going to be hearing a tone.

It's a continuous tone,
so it will start from a very low tone

and it will work its way up
to a very high sound.

So as soon as you hear the tone,
take a step forward,

and remain forward for as long as
you can hear the tone.

As soon as you stop hearing the tone,
take a step backwards.

If you haven't heard anything at all,

then you don't get to
take that step forward.

[Shalin] High tones are picked up

by the hairs that line
the outer channel of our cochlear,

and are therefore most prone to damage.

Low tones are picked up by the inner hairs
lining our cochlear, or inner ear.

Because they are more protected,
they are less vulnerable to damage.

So, what we are predicting is that

the young people will move forward
a bit quicker

and stay forward for longer
than the older people.

And I've also heard that some shops
stop teenagers loitering outside

by playing a high-pitched sound...

- Correct.
- ...to get rid of them,

but so the adults can
continue to come in and out.

- Yes, correct.
- Is that a thing?

- It was. Yes, it was.
- [laughter]

[Shalin] OK, here's your chance
to play along at home.

[silence]

[low tone]

I know it's not a competition,

but Sandro's 94-year-old grandmother Betty
has just stepped forward,

and I haven't heard a thing yet.

[high-pitched tone]

Wow, I can't see anyone else,

but I've stepped back before Betty,

which means while I can't hear
anything anymore,

she can still hear the tone.

Maybe Betty wasn't
a budding rock star in her youth.

[high-pitched tone]

OK, well done, everybody.

[Shalin] How'd we all go?

It was really interesting.

[laughter]

Everybody stepped out pretty quickly
with the low tones.

[Shalin] Right.
[Chyrisse] But it was the high tones,

the younger people remained
out of the circle for longer.

We do know that
the higher the noise exposure,

the quicker you'll get a hearing loss.

So, traffic noise,
probably about 80 to 90 decibels.

Enough to give you hearing loss
if you're doing that for long enough.

So, the higher the noise,
the less time you can spend in that noise.

Higher-frequency noise, factories,
workplaces, lawnmowers,

so that's why it's really good

when I see somebody mowing the lawn
and wearing earmuffs.

[Shalin] That's not good news
for an old muso like me.

If 94-year-old Betty seems to have
better hearing than I do,

that's cause for concern,

and that's what Dr Chyrisse thinks too.

Let's do a formal hearing assessment

and let's check out your hearing

and see if you've got
any hearing difficulties.

- That'd be great.
- OK.

[Shalin] Well, even though
it's probably damaged my hearing,

I still can't live without my music.

Which makes me wonder,

which of your senses do you derive
the most enjoyment from?

[Shalin] But if you don't have the use
of one or more of your senses,

it doesn't have to hold you back.

Helen Keller lost her sight and hearing
as a baby,

but famously went on to become
an author, teacher and musician.

[male voiceover]
...inspiration to unfortunates.

This was Helen Keller.

[Shalin] Claude Monet was diagnosed
with nuclear cataracts,

which some believe
altered his perception of colour,

to the extent where yellows and purples
began to predominate

in many of his later works.

Beethoven almost completely lost
his hearing,

but was still able to
compose masterpieces,

such as the Ninth Symphony.

[Beethoven's Ninth Symphony plays]

Like Beethoven, it may be that
I have permanent hearing damage.

[Chyrisse] If you can just face forward.

[Shalin] And that's what Dr Chyrisse
is about to test me for.

Well, you've got very clean--

- I've got clean ears?
- ...ear canals. Too clean.

- Too clean? Ooh.
- Too clean.

- You've been cleaning your ears.
- I do clean my ears.

- Not a good thing to do.
- Don't clean your ears?

No, no, you need earwax.

But it feels so good
with the earbuds, like, "Oh!"

- I know, I hear that a lot.
[Shalin] Yeah?

But the rule of thumb is,

nothing goes into the ear
that's smaller than your elbow.

- Smaller than your elbow?
- That size, that size.

Earwax protects anything
from flying into the ears.

[Shalin] OK.
- Like an insect, for example,

and you really don't want an insect
flying into your ear.

No, I do not.

[Chyrisse] So a little bit of earwax
is good,

so quite a lot of wax build-up,

best thing to do is to go off to your GP
and talk about how--

- How to get rid of that safely.
- Yep. Correct.

No poking in the ears.

OK, make the ears a dig-free zone. Got it.

Since earwax has been ruled out
as the cause of my hearing loss,

it's onto a formal hearing test.

I'm going to put the headphones
over your ears.

And you're going to be hearing some beeps.

OK.

And every time you hear a beep,
what I want you to do is press the button.

OK.

So, you're going to hear
some very low tones,

and you're going to hear
some very high tones.

So we might take your glasses off
just so that it's more comfortable.

No worries.

OK, I'll just put them over here.

So, are these like the tones we heard
in the demonstration?

No, not exactly the same,

'cause this is a
proper hearing assessment.

- How does that feel? Good?
- Very comfortable.

Good. Excellent.

OK, we're going to start now.

- Alright.
- Good.

[Shalin] I'm not alone
in being hard of hearing.

What's that, you say?

Over 5% of the world's population,

that's 360 million people,

have some form of hearing loss.

[Chyrisse] OK, Shalin, that was good,

except there's one frequency
that I'm a little bit concerned about.

[Shalin] OK.
- So put on your glasses,

and I'm going to explain
exactly what we've done.

And what we're looking at is
the softest tone you can hear

per ear per frequency.

And when we come to the high frequencies,
we can see your right ear's fine,

but yes, you actually do have a bit
of a hearing loss in your left ear.

In my left ear.

So you have a sensory neural hearing loss
in that area,

so 'sensory neural' meaning cochlear
or beyond the cochlear.

- OK, so it's right in there.
- It's right in there.

But could this account for my poor hearing
in loud environments?

Yes, because a lot of the consonants
that we hear in speech,

like the 'ss' and the 'shh' sounds,

are reliant on hearing, good hearing,
in those frequencies.

[Shalin] Being exposed to loud music
in my youth

is probably the cause of my poor hearing.

But strangely,
only one of my ears is affected.

That's something gun shooters,
rather than budding rock stars,

are more likely to suffer from.

[Chyrisse] You need to protect your ears,

certainly from that loud music
that you were talking about.

- Yep. Well, those days are over.
- OK.

[Shalin] Sadly, the damage is permanent
and may get worse as I get older.

I might even need a hearing aid one day.

What'd you say, old chap? Speak up.

Hearing aids have come a long way
since the ear trumpet,

but the most profound transformation
in hearing technology happened in 1982.

- Cochlear implants.
- Cochlear implants.

So, this would be suitable for somebody
with a hearing loss in both ears.

Probably of the more severe
to profound nature.

So, sound is picked up
in the speech processor,

goes through the magnetic coil,
to the electrode array in the cochlear.

Wow. So does that require surgery?

It does. So, they open up the ear,

and they insert this as a flap,
just underneath the skin.

So you're taking sound from the outside

and feeding it directly into
the inner ear.

- You are, yeah.
- That's extraordinary.

[drum beat, crowd cheering]

[Shalin] If I'd known just how much

loud noise would impact
my ability to socialise,

I'd have probably worn earplugs more
frequently to gigs when I was younger.

And I'll stop cleaning my ears
with cotton buds to avoid infection

and pushing wax into the eardrum,
making me even deafer.

And as much as carrots
won't necessarily help us see better,

green vegies will probably help.

Research has shown that eating plenty
of them could even improve your eyesight.

[Shalin] And as for our
all-important sense of touch,

it can be affected by poor circulation
and some medications,

so eat well and keep active.

It's easy to take our senses for granted,

but you don't know
what you've got till it's gone,

something young mum Leah
appreciates only too well

as her sense of smell
continues to restore her memories.

[Renee] Smells like him now.

Yes, and that's what it's meant to be
when you're a mum, isn't it?

[Renee laughs] Yes, indeed. Yes, indeed.