Placebos work, even when patients know they're phony, study shows

Placebos work, even when patients know they're phony, study shows

www.latimes.com

A simple sugar pill may help treat a disease — even if patients know they're getting fake medicine.

The finding, reported online Wednesday in the journal PloS One, may point the way to wider — and more ethical — applications of the well-known "placebo effect."

"The conventional wisdom is you need to make a patient think they're taking a drug; you have to use deception and lies," said lead author Ted Kaptchuk, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. And, Kaptchuk added,

(visit the link for the full news article)

This is one study that should make you go hmmmm. How interesting is it that Doctors can give you a placebo and tell you it's not real to treat a ailment and in 35% of the people tested they saw improvement in there condition.

I have always been into the whole placebo studies that showed improvement using Non medicated pills where you have people getting better, now it seems you can tell some one there not getting any real meds, but can improve in there condition non the less.... Very cool

Or we are witnessing the awesome healing power of sugar???

www.latimes.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Now all we need is a study that shows exactly what it is about one's beliefe that a placebo will make them better that achieves just that. Or would a study proving that the power of the mind/positive thought can be just as effective of pharmacieticles not go down to well? I won't hold my breath.

I use this effect fairly often in my daily life -- If I am socially anxious, I will put some water or juice in a cup I usually drink alcohol out of, and pretend that it is a small amount of booze. It also helps with Colds, and, to a lesser extent, the flu.

I've never used it to treat a real disease, but it works for common things like that even without an authority figure.

reply to post by quackers


As most drugs treat symptoms anyway instead of providing a cure this would suggest that it is the power of thought that is doing the healing.

I wonder if they will still call it "the placebo effect" since it can cure/help diseases/health issues even if the patient knows it is not real medicine? Shouldn't we just call this "mind over matter"? Clearly, the mind has reign over the body and can fix problems without any physical material like medicine... I don't know why science gives placebo such a hard time! If my stomach hurts and I take a sugar pill and it fixes the problem, well then, I just fixed my own problem with mah brain. Sweet article thx

It's an interesting study, but they really should have included a third group that received a placebo, and was told that they were receiving real medicine. It's already well established that the strength of a placebo is effected in many ways by the presentation. This study indicates that an "honest" placebo is better than nothing, but it doesn't tell us how it compares to one that uses the usual level of deception.

Originally posted by Namaste1001
reply to post by quackers

 

As most drugs treat symptoms anyway instead of providing a cure this would suggest that it is the power of thought that is doing the healing.

a star for your thinking....seems that there is truth in the saying, Physician, heal thyself. Our minds
are a very potent medication. If we believe we will get well, it does and WILL happen. We really are
quite "magickal" life forms...

Originally posted by tetsuo
I wonder if they will still call it "the placebo effect" since it can cure/help diseases/health issues even if the patient knows it is not real medicine? Shouldn't we just call this "mind over matter"? Clearly, the mind has reign over the body and can fix problems without any physical material like medicine... I don't know why science gives placebo such a hard time! If my stomach hurts and I take a sugar pill and it fixes the problem, well then, I just fixed my own problem with mah brain. Sweet article thx

Scientists don't "give placebo a hard time," placebos are known to have an effect, and when nothing better is available, they do see use in medicine. All modern medicines, though, are tested against placebos, not against nothing. A drug or medical procedure only becomes licensed when it is proven to perform better than a placebo.

reply to post by tetsuo

Clearly, the mind has reign over the body and can fix problems without any physical material like medicine

Depending on the individual case, I don't think that's a fair assumption to be making. If you're convincing your body to produce it's own 'medicine' , such as adrenaline, that's definitely "physical material".

It's not as if you're just fixing yourself with magical thoughts, your body is just operating how it thinks it should. For instance, I don't think you're going to want some homeopathic placebo pill if you get shot in the leg or something equally as severe. On top of that, placebos tend to focus on relieving symptoms rather then the cause itself.

reply to post by Desertopa

A drug or medical procedure only becomes licensed when it is proven to perform better than a placebo.

Unless it's some junk 'natural' cure like homeopathy which is a placebo itself.

Mix this with the recent news about "placebo" eating.... you know imagine you are eating something and lose weight...

It's amazing how what we accept to be true effects our reality.

Originally posted by Whyhi
reply to post by Desertopa

 

A drug or medical procedure only becomes licensed when it is proven to perform better than a placebo.

Unless it's some junk 'natural' cure like homeopathy which is a placebo itself.

Anything marketed as "alternative medicine" either hasn't been tested, or more often, hasn't passed properly conducted efficacy studies. Every piece of "alternative medicine" is called such because it has failed to earn the status of "medicine."

Caution placebos can be dangerous stuff.

Once while on placebos I had a fake orgasm and experienced phantom limb both at the same time while watering my false aralia when I was at a Plant Owners Without Partners event.

All I can say don't call anyone or send e-mails if you are on them lest you say regretful things.

Personally I think "placebo effect" is about a person's belief/energy that is healing them. The fact that science has acknowledged that its real, then dismissed it completely by intentionally designing experiments to account for it really irked me and is one of the reasons I put a stop to my science career.

This study looks interesting. I'd like to know if the people actually thought the doctor was lying and believed they were getting the real stuff, hence believing they would get better.

Also you have to factor in that a very high percentage of illnesses will improve without any treatment at all - i.e. medical treatment is given way more than its needed.

I remember that Rolling Thunder said that if you had no other medicine, to take a glass of water and offer it to the sun, and ask the great spirit to transform it into medicine, and that it WOULD be transformed into medicine.

Purdue Pharma has been manufacturing Placebo Oxycontin.

Imagine you're a cancer patient dying in wretched pain and they give you a fake narcotic....

Only in America.

It's a felony here for a Doctor to give you placebo controlled substances.

Billions of dollars is spent by Americans to buy medication....often they are given nothing but a sugar pill.

Of course you will find Pharmacuticals and Doctors pushing studies saying Placebo's work...they are pocketing Billions ripping us off by not giving real medication....only in America.

I worked with a Navy corpsman(medic) that used tabasco sauce as a pain med when he ran out in Vietnam,

He told the marines that it was a new powerful replacement for morphine but because it had a horrible taste no one could stomach it without mixing it with tabasco sauce.

There was no new pain med just tabasco sauce but it was not a placebo ether because the tabasco sauce is SO HOT the body releases endorphins that are as almost as strong as morphine.

If you don't believe me just take a spoon full of McIlhenny Tabasco sauce the next time you are in pain,

McIlhenny tabasco sauce has been used by the military since the Battle of Guadalcanal in WW2.
And for years it was given away free in any combat zone to the service.
en.wikipedia.org...

reply to post by Pervius


Can you give citations for any of that?

Originally posted by Cecilofs
Personally I think "placebo effect" is about a person's belief/energy that is healing them. The fact that science has acknowledged that its real, then dismissed it completely by intentionally designing experiments to account for it really irked me and is one of the reasons I put a stop to my science career.

They haven't dismissed it completely. They know it's real, but modern double blind experiments are predicated on the conviction that we can do better. You haven't proven that medicine is really medicine until you can show that it helps people more than a placebo does.

Of course doctors haven't rejected the placebo effect for use in treatment. Not only do they occasionally prescribe placebos when there's nothing better available, whenever you take real medicine, you're still getting the placebo effect in addition to the effects of the medicine itself. The placebo effect is not caused by taking something fake, it's caused by participating in something that feels like treatment. It's basically the lower limit for how effective a non-harmful medical procedure can be.