KTTV 11 News Featured Our Rapid Inexpensive “u-Smell-it” Smell Test

We are delighted to announce that KTTV 11 News featured our rapid, fast, inexpensive “u-Smell-it” smell test yesterday. The title is “New ‘smell test’ may help screen more people for COVID-19”.

[From the article]

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KKTV) – Millions of people are being tested for COVID-19 daily, which can mean long lines, and sometimes delayed results.

But what if there was an easier and cheaper way to test for one of the main symptoms of the virus, just by smelling something?

That just might be the case after a CU Boulder alum had the idea a few months ago.

“I think we expect that 95% of people who have loss of smell is because of covid very, very high, high percent,” Dr. Derek Toomre, the developer said.

Derek Toomre is a professor at Yale Medical School. He is a CU Boulder alum, and created the ‘usmellit’ test as a way to screen for COVID-19.

“You have the, the, basically the card and the app,” he said holding up the card with different scents. “And we scan the card and we’re given a number of windows. You, basically rub this, you pick something that you think is right.”

Loss of smell is a hallmark symptom of the virus. Not only can this help detect COVID, but its cost effective too. Each test cost just 50 cents.

“It works much better than we thought. If you do this twice or three times a week, you’re effective at preventing viral spread as doing complex molecular tests, which are much, much more expensive and really impractical to scale up to large numbers of people,” Dr. Roy Parker, a distinguished professor at CU Boulder said.

See the original article and video from KTTV 11 News