Ma Madeleine, the very first clinically validated olfactory rehabilitation kit
- Innovation
- Research
- Sustainable Development
on the April 23, 2025
Université Côte d'Azur, in partnership with Givaudan, Onepoint and CHU de Nice, has developed an application and kit to improve olfactory rehabilitation for people whose sense of smell has been affected by Covid-19 in particular. Unique in this field, the performance of this new solution has been validated by a clinical study.
Ma MadeleineTM is the first personalized home olfactory rehabilitation solution to include a semantic dimension. It is based on a combination of a mobile application, enabling doctors and speech therapists to remotely monitor the rehabilitation of patients suffering from long-lasting olfactory disorders, and a dedicated olfactory kit comprising 12 high-fidelity scents.
This solution is specifically designed to treat persistent dysosmia due to Covid-19, but also aims to facilitate access to olfactory rehabilitation for people affected by other diseases.
Photo credit: Onepoint
Ma MadeleineTM is the result of a collaboration started in January 2021 and conducted entirely remotely between the various players, who pooled their expertise to give birth to this innovation. Givaudan involved its perfumery and chemistry specialists; Université Côte d'Azur, its chemistry, speech therapy and neuroscience researchers; Nice University Hospital, its ENT surgery healthcare professionals; and Onepoint, its product design and user experience experts. This initiative also benefited from the financial support of the Givaudan Foundation.
Dr. Clair Vandersteen, ENT surgeon at the CHU de Nice (IUFC), commented: "Ma Madeleine perfectly illustrates the power of multidisciplinary collaboration in creating an innovative solution to help patients suffering from persistent olfactory disorders, restoring hope in the cure of a major sequela of Covid-19".
Promising solutions for other olfactory disorders
This new tool embodies the fruit of a multidisciplinary collaboration that is pushing back the boundaries of sensory rehabilitation. By restoring hope to patients affected by Covid-19, it also opens the way to promising solutions for other olfactory disorders, transforming this pandemic challenge into an olfactory therapeutic opportunity.
The project's origins lie in the finding that 30% of people affected by Covid-19 still suffer, one year later, from impaired sense of smell and taste1, significantly impacting their quality of life. In addition, the need to rehabilitate the sense of smell was so great during the pandemic that experts and doctors had to turn to olfactory games for the general public, aimed at children (for example: the "Loto des odeurs" game) in remote treatments, creating a shortage of these. The first 100 Ma MadeleineTM kits designed by Onepoint for patient testing were created in part using 3D printing based on recycled water bottles.
The kit has undergone clinical testing, and this research has been the subject of several publications in international journals [2]. The results of the studies carried out on this device demonstrated its effectiveness and superiority over all existing rehabilitation kits. This research led to the filing of a utility certificate, confirming the innovative dimension of the consortium's approach. The results of this test were integrated into the work of Dr. Clair Vandersteen's science thesis (defended on 20/12/2024) [3]. They confirm the effectiveness of this innovative device, and now pave the way for new fields of application, particularly in olfactory education.
All the research carried out during this first phase of work has enabled the construction of a functional kit, which could now be more widely distributed outside the strictly medical field.
1.Boscolo-Rizzo P, Guida F, Polesel J, et al. Self-reported smell and taste recovery in coronavirus disease 2019 patients: a one-year prospective study. Eur Arch Oto-Rhino-Laryngology. 2021;(0123456789). doi:10.1007/s00405-021-06839-w
