Bad taste

[Brightsky69]

I am sure this has been covered before. I have this odd taste in my mouth. It’s a sickly sweet taste. Almost like an artificial sweetener taste. Could I be overloaded? I am on PD and have cut out eating all the good stuff like cheese and ice cream and chocolate. Is there any one thing that could be causing this sickly sweet taste? I also watch how much fluid I take in. Drinking water completely gets rid of the taste. And sometimes this affects the way my food taste.

[jbeany]

It's usually more to do with a toxin overload than a fluid one.  I never had one on home hemo.  Now that I'm back on in-center, it's something I get frequently, especially after a weekend.  It may mean you are not getting adequate clearance.

[Brightsky69]

Well...at last check my clearence was great. They are going to be checking it here again this week. So we'll see.

[Brightsky69]

I was thinking....could my sinuses be the problem. They have been bothering me lately.

[KICKSTART]

What you are getting is common on PD its the glucose dialysis fluid !!!!  I used to get it alot then it stopped, but nothing seemed to trigger it , it just came and went from time to time!

[Brightsky69]

Please explain some more....I never heard of that.

[KICKSTART]

I dont know how to explain how it ends up in your mouth , but i used to get a sweet sickly taste all the time and i asked my renal doctor and thats what they said it is , i suppose it makes sense as fluid can get all round your body!

[Bajanne]

i know about that taste in my mouth, but I can't seem to pin it on anything specific.  All I know is that i have not had it for a long time and I am happy about that.

[jbeany]

I don't know how to explain how it ends up in your mouth , but i used to get a sweet sickly taste all the time and i asked my renal doctor and thats what they said it is , i suppose it makes sense as fluid can get all round your body!

Oh, that would make sense, too - I'm not on pd, so I didn't think of that.  Every time I get a dose of meds in my lines, I taste it.  Hectorol is kind of antiseptic tasting.  Aranesp isn't as bad.  I get a salt blast every time they flush the lines back with saline.  What happens is the meds enter your blood stream, and when they flow into the vessels in the surface of your tongue and mouth, sometimes it's strong enough for your taste buds to register it.  I imagine with PD dwelling in you, it would last much longer.

[Brightsky69]

So you guys are saying...the 'sugar' that is in my dialysis solution is actually showing up on my taste buds? I guess that makes sense. Although I go empty during the day.
The taste has died down a little bit. It's not as bad as it was.
Thanks for all the imput! 

[Restorer]

Oh, that would make sense, too - I'm not on pd, so I didn't think of that.  Every time I get a dose of meds in my lines, I taste it.  Hectorol is kind of antiseptic tasting.  Aranesp isn't as bad.  I get a salt blast every time they flush the lines back with saline.  What happens is the meds enter your blood stream, and when they flow into the vessels in the surface of your tongue and mouth, sometimes it's strong enough for your taste buds to register it.  I imagine with PD dwelling in you, it would last much longer.

Do you actually taste it on your tongue, the same way you would taste table salt? I have to admit I don't know exactly if the blood flow is different in hemodialysis than in a normal IV. With an IV, the first place the blood goes is the heart, then on to the lungs, then back to the heart, then out to everything else. Whenever an IV line I have gets flushed with saline, I "taste" it on my breath - but it's not a taste on my tongue, it's purely the smell factor of flavor.

[jbeany]

Hmm - guess I could hold my breath next time and see for sure.  It always tastes to me like it's in my tongue, and a sip of water makes it go away.