The Fifth Sense team were invited to deliver a webinar highlighting the importance of sense of smell, and impact of smell and taste disorders to the Metropolitan Police. This was presented on 19th January 2023 as part of their Lunch and Learn series.

Fifth Sense Ambassador and serving Met Officer, Carl Hughes, opened the session talking about his experience of losing sense of smell following an acquired brain injury.

Carl said “For the last 20 years I have had the pleasure of policing London, and over that time there have been a lot of challenges, not least those created by my loss of smell. Being able to share my experiences of smell loss with colleagues and help them realise how it can affect day to day policing with the help of Fifth Sense has been a great step towards wider recognition of this disability.”

Many of the Met Police staff in attendance valued sense of smell as part of their role – 85% rated it as extremely important to them in a poll taken during the session! Examples of this include not being able to smell alcohol on a suspect’s breath, or detect a gas leak when on a call out to someone who has collapsed at home.

The talk covered a variety of topics from the impact of smell and taste disorders on people’s health, wellbeing and safety, to highlighting the range of services and support provided by Fifth Sense.

Fifth Sense CEO and Founder, Duncan Boak, added “It has been great working with Carl and his colleagues in the Met on this session. It’s very positive to see the recognition from serving officers of how important smell is to their professional roles and the understanding of how smell disorders can impact on themselves, colleagues, their staff and the public they serve.”