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Bluelight Crew
In what researchers call a novel 'mind-body' therapy, most patients in a study suffering from irritable bowel syndrome reported relief after receiving pills they were told contained no real medicine.
By Amina Khan, Los Angeles Times
December 22, 2010, 4:12 p.m.
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, it seems many doctors do this: In one report, as many as half of rheumatologists and internists surveyed said they had intentionally given patients ineffective medication in the hopes it would have a positive result.
continued at
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-he-placebo-effect-20101223,0,3010085.story
By Amina Khan, Los Angeles Times
December 22, 2010, 4:12 p.m.
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, it seems many doctors do this: In one report, as many as half of rheumatologists and internists surveyed said they had intentionally given patients ineffective medication in the hopes it would have a positive result.
continued at
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-he-placebo-effect-20101223,0,3010085.story
