The Sensational History of the Sensa System

Sensa has been on the market since 2007, but it was not Dr. Hirsch's first weight loss product. In the early 1990's, Dr. Hirsch recruited 3,193 dieters to carry inhalers filled with aromatic ingredients, which they were to inhale whenever they felt hungry. They were told to follow their usual diet and exercise habits, and at they were given a new inhaler each months. At the end of six months, the average participant in the study had lost 30 pounds (13.5 kilos). The aromatherapy ingredients used in this study became SlimScents , which are now marketed separately from Dr. Hirsch.


Dr. Hirsch's second product involved both scent and taste. In 2005, he gave 1,436 diet patients a product he called Tastant crystals. At the end of six months, the average weight loss was 30.5 pounds—slightly more than for SlimScents. Tastant Crystals are now marketed as Sensa.

You can see ads for Sensa on QVC and the Home Shopping Network as well as on late night television on other channels. Sensa is also offered from the company website. A one-month supply of the crystals is $59, with discounts for buying three and six months of the crystals in a single order. "Hundreds of thousands" of home dieters, according to Hirsch, have lost weight with Sensa.

Are There Other Products That Get Similar Results?

Dr. Hirsch is not the only investigator to find that aroma blunts appetite. Dr. Bryan Raudenbusch, an associate professor of psychology at Wheeling Jesuit University in West Virginia, recruited 40 people to try an experiment. These volunteers smelled peppermint or a placebo every 2 hours during the day for five days. Over the five days the study participants sniffed peppermint every 2 hours during the day, they ate a total of 1,800 fewer calories.

Long Beach, California life coach now markets Peppermint Happy Scent for just $5.50 a bottle. Users open the bottle and shake peppermint-soaked beads to kill hunger.

And the makers of SlimScents now offer it for free for six months or until the user has lost 2.5% of his or her body weight . "We have never had anyone who used the product properly who did not lose weight," SlimScents president Mark Cohen told the New York Times.

Still, not everyone who uses any of these products loses weight. And researchers at the NIZO Food Research Center in the Netherlands offer a different way to enjoy the full aroma of foods— take small bites, and hold the food in the mouth as long as possible while chewing thoroughly . The benefits of eating slowly seem to accumulate during the meal. Just eating more slowly—the opposite of the eating behavior displayed by Rick Broun at the Big Texas steak house over his 72-ounce steak—may be as beneficial as Sensa or other aromatherapy products for losing weight.

It's only common sense (that has been confirmed in laboratory research) that the smaller the bite, the less you eat. Eating less and eating more slowly also help dieters lose weight. But if you are a big food fan and you just can't keep yourself from digging into your food, try Sensa.