Just a note: The thumbnail of this video appears greyed-out, which is a style you might want to avoid since I almost skipped it thinking I had already seen it.

I think another important thing to take into account is that adding something to placebos can have a positive effect. Drinking more water, because of fake pills can be helpful. Exercising because you're told that will help a medication work can make you healthier. Additionally, those that take placebos regularly with doctor's orders, are likely more active in following other advice that yields positive results. Maybe laziness is the cause of many health issues. Lack of physical engagement and follow-through will lead to a lack of positive results. Also, sitting for long periods is said to be worse for health than smoking. In short, sometimes anything is better than nothing.

Placebos are insane. People can get addicted and suffer withdrawal. It still can work even when the person knows. It shouldn't work, but it does.

@gorillaguerillaDK

9 жыл бұрын

It's true! It works, sometimes even when the person receiving treatment knows it's placebo - probably cause such a person knows that placebos works - thereby enhancing the effect!

@mrtalos

9 жыл бұрын

Read into it a few years ago. There's a lot about it we just don't understand. Interesting stuff

@gorillaguerillaDK

9 жыл бұрын

***** you are on to something, except that would technically be a "nocebo" effect and not "placebo". Besides, you would still need food to meet your nutritional needs, so more often we see it with certain food types than food in general... Examples can be in kids whos parents have told them they can't eat certain foods and will get sick if they do. We can use "raw food" parent's as an example - they are "religious" about not eating cooked food, and if they run the same regime on their children and the child eats a cooked meal, it will feel some discomfort - and so this small discomfort due to change in diet will be felt way more stronger and percieved as sickness.. So it's not the food that MAKES them sick, (the discomfort will go away as they get used to the new diet), but their perception of the food as being the cause of illness/sickness..

@gorillaguerillaDK

9 жыл бұрын

***** yes, like sugar and kids.... and certain food allergies... (not diminishing those who actually do suffer from these allergies, but there is certainly people who have convinced themselves that they will get sick if they eat things that they should have no problem eating - but don't start blaming everyone for doing so)... ;-)

@Nate303

9 жыл бұрын

You just have to beliiiieeeeeeeve!

I used to work in a compounding pharmacy - a pharmacy that can make medications. We usually made creams and ointments, but we had a few capsules we'd make too. We had one elderly patient that insisted to her doctor that nothing was helping her headaches, and she was on a considerable amount of pain medication. Her doctor got in touch with our pharmacy, and asked us to compound a special headache medication for her called Obecalp. It seemed to do the trick.

Oooh I can't wait for next week :D I've had a few surgeries in a relatively short period of time so I'm super curious.

I think placebos can be a great tool for healing. The biggest ethical problem I can see (assuming care is continual, so that if the placebo isn't working, the doctor can switch to a non-placebo treatment) is if the patient is paying for their treatment (especially any out-of-pocket payment). Placebos in a free, universal health care system, though, have few ethical problems that I can see (again, assuming care and monitoring is continual).

@guuu881

9 жыл бұрын

Another ethical issue is that if patients are aware that they might be taking a placebo, that could prevent it from being effective. In fact, it probably makes real medication less effective if the patient thinks the medicine is just a placebo. Moreover, it could lead to some patients skipping or taking double doses thinking that it doesn't really matter, which could be quite problematic.

@RBuckminsterFuller

9 жыл бұрын

guuu881 Some studies have actually shown that knowing you're taking a placebo doesn't completely diminish the placebo effect.

@tiagovasc_

9 жыл бұрын

RBuckminsterFuller I've seen the opposite.

@Cloud_Seeker

9 жыл бұрын

The biggest ethical problem I have with it is homeopathy. Its sold as a replacer of real medicine and is nothing but a placebo. You don't need that heart medicine to help preventing strokes, here have a bottle of pills that fix all the problems. Just make sure to not take to many or you might get a OD...... or you can just take the whole bottle because its just binders anyway. Oh yea its more expensive than real medicine as well.

@wafelsen

9 жыл бұрын

Why is an out-of-pocket payment for a placebo more problematic than an insurer paying for a placebo? If it works, then no problem with anyone paying for it. If it doesn't, why should anyone pay for it?

Love this channel

Really looking forward for my stuff arriving from DFTBA

I would love to see a video about evidence for/against chiropractic care... I've seen many patients waste a lot of money, and a few get injured, by chiropractors.

The placebo effect is a really interesting occurrence in the healthcare world. It is just amazing how just the belief of having been given a treatment makes us feel better or like his example of how children who believe they were given sugar acted with more energy. I think it is also important how he mentioned how a placebo doesn’t mean a lack of care. Placebos are a very common form of controversy ethically. The idea that people are not being given the same medicine as another that might very well help them is bothersome. What is important to understand is that the way the patients are treated and their environment is all kept the same. There is no preference placed on those who are receiving the drug that is being studied as this would compromise the legitimacy of the study.

I really like this channel.

I love this show!

I like you when you look happy or amused ^^

You should do a video on food allergies and epinephrine.

A really good book that I just had to read for my Medical Anthropology class on this subject was Meaning, Medicine, and the 'Placebo effect' by Daniel Moreman. It covers these subjects and the research on it. For those of you who are interested anyways.

I have had sciatica problems for a couple of years. I have tried many things but I have seen that the chiropractic was the quickest relieve I have had. I have always been skeptical of chiropractors but the change was so immediate that it made me revise my assumptions. I came across an old episode of Penn and teller about this practice and had left me a bit disheartened. Could you comment on the effectiveness of chiropractors and other physical therapies for sciatica and bulging discs.

Are there any good studies about the effectiveness of the placebo effect when you know you're taking a placebo, but also count on the strong placebo effect to help you? I've been looking for a good study about this, but I haven't found any.

My wife (an MD) is constantly frustrated she can't actually prescribe a generic placebo medication and have it dispensed. She does have an option in some cases (tessalon pearls for cough) but they are not cheap, and thus present a real problem in her quest to help patients feel better when what they really have to do is wait for their bodies to heal.

@nolanthiessen1073

9 жыл бұрын

Yeah, charging someone for a placebo seems like a moral issue for me.

@jibbyjackjoe

9 жыл бұрын

Nolan Thiessen Eh, you're charging for making the patient feel better.

Can you do a video on the nocebo effect please?

Healthcare Triage , I have a question. Do placebos also work on people who know it's a placebo and don't think the treatment will work? My family is trying to get me to use "essential oils" but I'm not about to waste my money on something that hasn't been properly tested to show it works. Will my negative view on oils stop the placebo effect from happening?

Is acupuncture a placebo? I have a family member who swears it helps her fibromylagia. Is there enough research on that yet to determine if it is a placebo? Or is that a topic for another video? :)

What about negative placebo effects? Do studies ever show a tendency (with the placebo) towards negative side effects when placebos are used in studies?

Question for HT: What happens when the placebo is revealed? Say a patient has been taking sugar pills for headaches and feels that they work. But then they find out that it's just sugar and not a painkiller.. does the effect stop and they perceive their headaches to be worse, or do they realise that they don't actually need the pills at all? What if I have an intrinsic trust of a certain brand, but I want to switch to a cheaper generic brand.. and I KNOW that it's the same active ingredient, yet somehow have this feeling that maybe there's something about the brand name pills that is better, even if I have no rational reason for this. How can someone think themselves out of that?

A homeopathic patient died of an overdose. He forgot to take his homeopathic medication.

The problem I have with placebos is that when a treatment does not work I assume there is not an affective treatment and just quietly suffer. Taking off work to go to the doctor is quite a hassle and they are usually booked a few weeks in advance so I only go if I have to and I'm not going twice unless I'm desperate.

Is the placebo effect universal? I'm generally skeptical about medications, from over-the-counter to prescription, which often seem to take longer or have less of the desired effect than indicated. I don't expect to feel better until I see it with my own eyes (or whatever other senses are involved). If I had a problem that concerned me enough to see my doctor, I wouldn't be happy to be given a placebo for it.

Can doctors legally prescribe placebos? Also, have they ever done a study on the Placebo Effect on cancers? And if they did, would they have disclosed it publicly (since the treatment's success would be compromised)?

So does this mean a placebo would not work if the person receiving treatment knows it has no effective ingredient/any other benefit? Also, isn't prescribing antibiotics for something that isn't bacterial poor practice? relating to antibiotic resistant bacteria and future treatments, or even effects of gut flora.

Howdy, Dr. Carroll -- I've heard that it's possible for people to benefit from placebo treatment even when they are informed they are receiving placebo treatment, but have been unable to find any references about this. Do you know if this is true?

@In2hardcore

9 жыл бұрын

I have found that most of the references to this on the internet link pack to a single study. While patients were informed they were taking a placebo, the language used to describe them was leading and deliberately ambiguous. This is the what the patients receiving the placebo were told “placebo pills made of an inert substance, like sugar pills, that have been shown in clinical studies to produce significant improvement in IBS symptoms through mind-body self-healing processes” You can read the article here Placebos without Deception: A Randomized Controlled Trial in Irritable Bowel Syndrome www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0015591

If my doctor makes me feel better, I don't care why or what lie he is telling me. It's when he doesn't end up making me feel better, or after the fact, that I want the truth. It isn't like I understand much of what they're doing anyways.

I'm disappointed in this video because of the failure to distinguish between the use of placebos in subjective outcomes vs objective outcomes. In cholesterol lowering medication I understand the patient may say they feel better if they receive a placebo but objective measures of cholesterol show no change under placebo. Same goes for high blood pressure. Patient may say they feel better but when you measure their blood pressure it's the same. Placebos work for subjective outcomes but not so much for objective outcomes that can be directly measured. Also when a patient says they feel better does not necessarily mean they are better. Also when testing the effectiveness of a treatment, when the treatment is no better than a placebo, the only correct interpretation is that the treatment should be discarded.

@JennFox-ub2kl

9 жыл бұрын

Dan Doxworthy Agreed! Strangely, this shows up right under +eyeammi's post.

@lyn0002

9 жыл бұрын

We shouldn't disregard the potential physiological benefits resulting from the psychological effects of placebo. Placebos can reduce stress, improve adherence to treatments, improve patient-doctor relationships, etc. These psychological effects often (not always) result in improved physiological (read: objective) outcomes down the road. The fact that this effect is not direct doesn't make it any less valuable. Here's a study which illustrates this quite nicely: Ariel et. Al. (1972) “Anabolic Steroids: The Physiological Effects of Placebos,” Medicine and Science in Sports, vol. 4, 124-26. In this study, participants put on a sham steroid regimen saw a roughly *four-fold* increase in objective strength outcomes relative to the control group. Just believing they were on steroids was enough to quadruple the results from a given training program. It's highly likely that the belief that they were on steroids lead participants to train harder and invest more in the final tests. But it's hard to argue that the massive increases in strength don't represent an objective outcome. In this case we can speculate that the behavioral changes alone were enough to make the use of the placebo worthwhile.

@Overonator

9 жыл бұрын

lyn0002 They got a 4 fold increase in strength because they trained harder. I could get the same results from them if I told them that if they didn't get stronger I would kill their pet. That too me looks like the placebo was just motivation.

@lyn0002

9 жыл бұрын

Overonator Yes, that's exactly the point. The psychological effect of the placebo (increased training motivation, in this case) was enough to produce a massive increase in strength - an objective variable. So the placebo was highly effective.

@Overonator

9 жыл бұрын

lyn0002 No the massive increase in strength came from the greater training which came from the motivation which came from the placebo. There is a chain of cause and effects.

If you're conducting an RCT and the placebo is more effective than the test treatment (statistically significant), does that mean the test treatment is unequivocally producing worse outcomes than not using it?

So I can will myself through benzo and antidepressant withdrawal? Sounds ridiculous, I know, but, just Where is the line drawn?

wait in the episode you mentioned pills used as a placebo as sugar pills. how do we know that in the sugar trails the placebo wasn't also sugar.

@nolanthiessen1073

9 жыл бұрын

That's described in the original video. The researchers used an artificial sweetener.

Is it possible for someone to build a "tolerance" to a placebo?

Placebos were used a few times in WW2, for instance Dr Henry K. Beecher in WW2 ran out of morphine and was found that a simple saline drip that he said was morphine was enough to relieve the suffering of wounded soldiers , some of whom had grievous injuries.

Two things I remember reading; 1. The placebo effect also works if patients know they are getting a placebo. I remember a study in which people were told they got a placebo, and then got one, and still reported improvement. A bigger a medical intervention, such as an salt injection, a fake surgery etc, the more effective a placebo treatment is. Interesting. 2. If you study the effects of a certain treatment, saying it works better than a placebo is by this time meaningless. We already have many, many treatments that are better than a placebo. What we want to know is if the new treatment is better than the old one. In Brian Cox's book about pharmaceutical fraud and "fraud" he explains that pharmaceutical companies who compare test results from their treatment with a placebo treatment usually want to mask that the new treatment is just as good, or possibly worse, than the existing treatment.

You really need a homeopathy episode now. Those things is all about placebo but sold as real medicine and marketed as such.

I would love to see a Healthcare Triage on suboxone, naloxone, and methadone!

I personally support the use of placebos by healthcare professionals and have no ethical issues with it as long as the placebo is not likely to do any harm (e.g. giving antibiotics to cold sufferers) or withholding an alternative effective treatment.

I've never seen a problem with doctors or anyone for that matter using placebos. If it ultimately helps the patient then what difference does it make. The mind is a powerful thing and if using a placebo helps your mind heal your body, well then that's awesome.

Indeed. As a matter of fact, I see "healing magic" as a form of "invoking" the placebo effect... For great justice! (Okay, that last bit was there just to be silly)

Stupid question... does sugar make a fetus move more? Is that different than hyperactivity in kids?

Placebos are AWESOME.

Chiropractic, homeopathy and acupuncture. Any reason not to include police? Or government?

I once saw a documentary where they were developing and testing an antivenom for something, can't remember if it was a snake or a wasp or whatever, and they actually did a placebo controlled test. Meaning they actually deliberately envenomated a guy whom they knew had not received real antivenom. I understand the placebo effect is powerful, but there's no way those doctors could have really thought a placebo could help something like anaphylaxis or a sharp drop in blood pressure. I feel like that test had to be illegal or at least ethically objectionable.

There is also a special brand of placebo, homeopathy.

@pmyou2

9 жыл бұрын

***** Be careful to not paint with a broad brush. Sure, trying to cure cancer or diabetes with chiropractic is not going to get you anywhere. But chiropractic is a mechanical manipulation process. It involves many different individual techniques. For myself, I have occasional back problems. I have problems if I try to carry something heavy with one hand. My solution is to use an inversion device. Yup, I hang upsides down so that gravity can help release a spasm as I relax into that position. This device I purchased from my chiropractor. So I have a problem and a treatment and an explanatory mechanism for why it works. I have enough instances where I have used it and not used it to convince myself that this is a real non-placebo treatment for the condition I have. I have gone to physical therapy to traditional physical therapists and experiences some of the same techniques as in a chiropractic office: estim, massage, various manipulations. It is easy to take a label and mistake it for a definition. The problem is that labels are rarely so precise.

@pmyou2

9 жыл бұрын

***** You are correct that I did not set up my experiences as an actual experiment with all the controls necessary to prove out a thesis. But, knowing that, I am not trying to prove chiropractic is this or that. What I am trying to point out is simply that the term 'chiropractic' is not well defined and can be used ambiguously. I do feel, as a result of my experience, that some chiropractic methods do provide some real relief beyond placebo and that these methods do include some manipulations that are not in the standard repertoire of traditional physical therapy, as I have had experience with both chiropractic care and physical therapy treatments for similar / related issues and distinct times. I can accept that some claims for chiropractic go beyond reasonable. Nothing is beyond criticism. I was not trying to claim proof to the 95th percentile.

@Lac0na

9 жыл бұрын

***** pmyou2 Just to add my 2 cents into this conversation, I remember reading a while ago that "chiropractic" treatment (whatever it may mean) was shown to not provide any relief from pain -- except for back pain only.

@VinSad

9 жыл бұрын

Lac0na It's also a placebo...

What's really awesome is that you can even tell people in trials that they're getting a placebo and it still works better than getting no treatment at all. Perhaps the knowledge of the placebo effect is causing the placebo effect...?

The placebo effect is an interesting thing. Broken down it is considered a treatment method, but in all reality it is all just a mind game. However, I have no doubt that it does work for a majority of people. The only time that it is drastically obvious that placebos do not actually heal certain medical issues is during an experiment. People who take the placebo may appear or think that they have improved results but on paper and lab results nothing remotely changes. In less intense situations, such as minor health problems, a person can in a sense fool their body that it is healed. The brain is a powerful and smart tool that I believe is capable of accomplishing the results of the placebo effect.

There is nothing woo about placebo's. For one a lot of what we think we observe is in fact what the brains tells us we observe. This certainly includes things like pain, anxiety, discomfort and stress. The placebo effect is strongest on such symptoms. Don't underestimate what stress and anxiety reduction alone can do for a person. If you ever get around to do an episode about mindfulness (Please!!!) remember that once you get better conscious control over what a placebo does surreptitiously you get the same effect without placebo's and the ethical grey area.

didn't the authors of the sugar-on-kids study say they didn't trust their results, because the trial was done in a sanitized environment, as opposed to the real world where the kids might behave differently?

I'm not sure a bandage is a placebo. It's an acknowledgement of their suffering, which may end tears without changing their physical pain. We assume pain is the cause of tears, but it may not be.

Yeah science!

What would actually help back pain, then?

@VinSad

9 жыл бұрын

Chiropractors (via placebo effect), witch doctors (via placebo effects) or complicated and expensive surgery that may or may not exist.

The placebo effect is very interesting but I'm still not sure how I feel about it. There are mixed feelings on this topic; For one I still think it is wrong for doctors and hospitals to save money of the placebo surgery but for the patience to have to pay in full for getting not even half of a procedure. Second I think its a good idea to not actually have to go through the whole procedure and that the placebo actually works.

The mind is a powerful tool and can be used to benefit a patient if used properly. I like the idea of a placebo because a person finds it within themselves to become better without realizing they are doing it. If the mind can be used to aid a patient back to health rather than drugs, then it should be done. There are a couple things this video could have done better however. It is important to recognize that some diseases or surgeries do require medication to be taken in order to get better. For example, my mother received open heart surgery last year and is on several medications even though she wishes to be. If she were to see this video, due to her hate to take several different medications, she may perceive that placebos work better than actual medication. In her case, this is not the truth and it would likely kill her if she tried. This is not true for all cases, but it is especially important to recognize the distinction. Also, I don't like the idea of a doctor manipulating your healing process. What if a doctor gives you a placebo, believes it should work and actually doesn't? The patient spent time suffering in order to see if a doctor's intuition came true. Patients should trust their doctors but the idea of placebos breaks that trust. Placebos are important and a positive method of helping patients if used under the right circumstances.

Does placebo works on children?

Healthcare Triage I still don't understand how placebos can be made for psychoactive drugs. If the drug being tested is _supposed_ to have an effect on the _mind_ rather than the _body_ (whatever the precise limits between those two are), how does one distinguish between the "physical" effect and the "placebo" effect? Is there even a difference?

@Meloncov

9 жыл бұрын

Psychoactive drugs affect the brain, not the mind. There's a physical effect there, just like any other drug. And you compare psychoactive drugs to a placebo the same way you would any other drug; you see how patients on the real drug do in comparison to patients on the placebo.

@f43d348k

9 жыл бұрын

Kevin Baker Well, but wouldn't the patients know if they recieved the placebo or not? As an extreme example, suppose you want to try LSD as a treatment for whatever. The people using the placebo will not go on a trip, and so the double blind nature of any proper medical trial goes out the window, doesn't it?

@Meloncov

9 жыл бұрын

You mean to study the long term effects? Doing a double blind test on the long term effects of any drug with really obvious short term effects is presumably generally not possible, but that challenge isn't exclusive to psychoactive drugs.

@f43d348k

9 жыл бұрын

Kevin Baker Well, you don't have to do a long term study for these problems to exist. Also, I'd think the problem would be more pronounced with psychoactive drugs because of their more intimate connection to the mind (even though I take your point that they effect the brain, not the mind directly), because their effects are more difficult to simulate or hide...

This leads to the question of the power of prayer as a form of placebo.

@ThePharphis

9 жыл бұрын

I'm sure this has been tested.. iirc those who prayed exhibited negative response but I don't remember the variable and now I also can't remember whether or not the patient prayed or someone else prayed for them. Either way, it showed prayer to be useless, which makes sense. Should be able to find it via google

@nolanthiessen1073

9 жыл бұрын

I read a study a few years ago that claimed that people with religious beliefs were more likely to survive near death experiences than those without. I can't seem to find the paper right now though.

@ThePharphis

9 жыл бұрын

Nolan Thiessen that'd be more interesting to learn about. My first impression is that the religious are more likely to think they're experience a near-death experience than others, though. Careful methodology would be crucial here

@nolanthiessen1073

9 жыл бұрын

ThePharphis Again, I can't find the paper, but from what I remember, it was done by researchers who used a sample of patients in operating rooms in Canada. Under the care of surgeons, I would _assume_ the researchers relied on the surgeon's word over the patients in terms of what sort of severity was involved.

@nolanthiessen1073

9 жыл бұрын

I can't find the paper I originally mentioned, but here's another along similar lines which also found that association with religious beliefs affected survival rates, regardless of which beliefs were held. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/lt.22122/abstract

Why is there no mechanism for doctors to prescribe placebos?

@VinSad

9 жыл бұрын

Because what if you prescribe a placebo to a patient at risk of a heart attack and the placebo doesn't work?

@lairdf

9 жыл бұрын

I'm not suggesting a placebo when a better drug will work, I'm suggesting an ability to script a placebo for ailments that don't require drugs (ie a common cold). If we know a placebo works better than nothing then it might be an interesting option

I

Shit I think I'll open a bar and start selling alcohol free booze to the drunks. The cost savings will be amazing!

Placebo Industry: See Also, "Homeopathy".

I still want my sugar pills. With coffee of course.

I believe there have been a trial where the target/patient is told the treatment is a placebo, before use and it sill works And yes these people knew what placebo means. I believe Parkinson's sufferers are more effected than many, a problem for their trials.

If my physician knows that a pill with active ingredients is no more effective than a placebo, I would much rather she prescribed the placebo.

What about reverse placebo effects? Wimpy Tylenol and other over the counter pain meds don't do shit for me. Is my mind making them not work?

@Cloud_Seeker

9 жыл бұрын

You might just have built up a resistance, or you are feeling phantom pains when it does work. You doesn't feel the pain but you know you should feel pain enough to make you feel it anyway.

@alberthollow1737

9 жыл бұрын

Yeah, its called nocebo. It's when you are give a sugar pill but told it has side effects and then you feel those side effects that shouldn't be there.

@nolanthiessen1073

9 жыл бұрын

Albert Hollow That's not really the nocebo effect. Nocebo is feeling pain because you believe you'll fell pain. ***** example doesn't seem like he's getting *more* pain when they take medication. It just sounds like it's ineffective which is probably based on resistance.

@alberthollow1737

9 жыл бұрын

The definition from google: "In medicine, a nocebo (Latin for "I shall harm") is an inert substance that creates harmful effects in a patient. The nocebo effect is the adverse reaction experienced by a patient who receives a nocebo."

@nolanthiessen1073

9 жыл бұрын

Exactly. From Karozans description, I assume that the Tylenol aren't causing him harm, just not working to alleviate his pain.

This is why I always take my pirin tablets.

What about placebos for pets? Does that work? What about placebos for unconscious patients? Does that have any affect?

@Cloud_Seeker

9 жыл бұрын

What do you think. Placebo is a physiological effect, how should it have a effect if you are unconscious. Its kind of asking if people can have a meaningful debate with other people when asleep and dreaming.

@pmyou2

9 жыл бұрын

Cloud Seeker Well, unconscious people have a physiology. People in a coma have been shown to have consciousness, even though they lack the ability to respond. Anesthetics deaden our response to pain, but not all anesthetics deaden out perception of pain. In some cases the anesthetics simply make it so that we do not care about the pain. (After all, pain is a mechanism by which the body identifies a situation in the body that needs attention and decision. Beyond that, there is no real need for pain and it can be 'ignored'.) If the brain is still processing input, most particularly through skin sensations, then are there placebo treatments (not specifically pills) that can have an affect on the unconscious or even comatose patient? And as far as ca people 'have a meaningful debate with other people when asleep and dreaming', well, outside phenomena can affect a persons dream state. So while the debate may not be verbal, there can be a response, and one that can be detected externally by current technology (though still in its infancy) to record dreams and thoughts. Look it up. The info is readily available.

@Cloud_Seeker

9 жыл бұрын

pmyou2 Go and talk to a rock, it will have the same effect as a placebo treatments has on unconscious people because there is no way for any one of them to even know they are geting the treatment. To know you get the treatment is a key component in a placebo, that is what makes the placebo. If you don't know about the treatment you can't react to it.

@pmyou2

9 жыл бұрын

Cloud Seeker An unconscious person is not a rock. There are brain activity going on even without consciousness. You say "To know you get the treatment is a key component in a placebo". Now think in detail what that means. The "to know" criteria is the question. Does an unconscious individual have a perception of touch? I am guessing it does. That is how we can wake someone by touching them. If you have a coma patient and you give an injection. Does that person's brain process nerve signals that record that it has been stuck with a needle? My guess is that it does. The problem with a coma patient is that the reaction is not possible. I notice you did not object to my question about pets. The communication of 'this is going to help you' can be a detail to be worked out there, too. An analogy for the coma patient: a computer with the monitor and speakers detached. The keyboard, mouse and microphone are still working find. But not output is possible. In this analogy the question becomes: can input be provided and processed. I am guessing it can. It might be harder to provide clear input that the person is receiving treatment, but that mostly depends on if you are open minded enough to think of an effective method.

@pmyou2

9 жыл бұрын

aku ski Pets often expect to be pampered and cared for. And I am considering pets instead of wildlife. (I work with rehabilitating injured wildlife. They can die from the stress of being handled by humans despite our best efforts to minimize human contact.) In science it is often the ingeniousness of the researcher to come up with a novel experimental design that brings about the breakthrough. I am never quick to discount possibilities just because others have not already been doing it for centuries. So, can you think of any way to communicate to a pet that 'this thing I am doing is meant to help you get better'? That is the first question to answer.

All of which is why I do not object to my wife taking herself and my son to chiropractic care.

Am I the only one who doesn't see anything surprising about the placebo effect? We know that where their is any amount of subjectivity or ambiguity people will have a tendency to perceive what they want and expect to perceive. This is the whole reason we have a scientific method, which researchers use to force themselves to stick to what is unambiguously supported by experimental data, rather than what the experiment "seems to suggest".

@mirrortestant1796

9 жыл бұрын

I've looked at a study for placebos and the standard derivation is pretty high. The placebo effect could possibly be statistically unsignificant for half the people and the "homeopathy believing person" is responsible for the outcome. I would be interested in a study, where doctors are the patients and prescribed placebos. But I have not found anything.

surgical placebo - scary

@VinSad

9 жыл бұрын

Think chiropractic surgery

I'm sorry, but since when does 10% and 100% "mirror" 45% and 76%?? This coming from authors that would probably prove that the difference between 67.01% in one group and 67.02% in another group is statistically significant.

@VinSad

9 жыл бұрын

Where is this?

@kristase

9 жыл бұрын

At 3:47

@VinSad

9 жыл бұрын

He means that doctors in other countries also use placebo treatments. He wasn't referring to the numbers themselves, but the fact that they existed.

@kristase

9 жыл бұрын

Vin Sad even so, a very big stretch, not sure 10% constitutes "use" for a large aggregate

@VinSad

9 жыл бұрын

cookiesforobama And so?

I'm actually quite disappointment with this episode of Healthcare Triage. Mainly because it makes the placebo effect sound as if it was some kind of magical or mysterious power that allows the mind to heal itself. The placebo effect is a complicated amalgamation of direct effects (obviously, tricking the mind also affects things that are artifacts of the mind, such as pain or anxiety), indirect effects (such as changes in behavior), psychological effects (such as bias when reporting the level of symptoms) and other effects (some of which are clear, and some of which aren't). Ignoring these facts and concentrating "how important the placebo effect is", will only encourage the magical thinking often found around the subject of the placebo effect. In fact, I shuddered at the use of phrases like: "The mind-body connection is strong". I can't think of of more "New Agey" way of describing placebos. Happy thoughts and sugar pills may reduce the discomfort of cancer treatments through the release of endorphins. They may spur a change to a healthier lifestyle. But they surely do not directly reduce the size of tumors. And I'M sure Dr. Carll would agree with this. The mind-body connection *is* strong, but it also very indirect and is (mostly!) *not* mysterious. This episode *needs* a more scientific and rigorous followup that addresses how the placebo effect works. P.S. "[...] only 22% percent of patients though it was *never* ok for a doctor to prescribe some sort of placebo therapy.": Nice use of an absolute there! I am vehemently against the use of placebos by Doctors, but even I would not say they should /never/ use them. In fact, I can think of a few cases where it would be fine,

😉

Does that mean homeopathic medicine should be used because people believe it does something?

Can you kill someone via nocebo?

@mrtalos

9 жыл бұрын

Only indirectly

@gorillaguerillaDK

9 жыл бұрын

LOL

@VinSad

9 жыл бұрын

You can, and there are even reports of people coming close to dying from nocebos. Think gas leak hoax.

@gorillaguerillaDK

9 жыл бұрын

Vin Sad coming close isn't the same as it has happened! I would love to see it if you can show me any studies that have proven nocebo as a reason of death...

@VinSad

9 жыл бұрын

GorillaGuerilla They were only saved from dying via medical treatment. And plus, any studies on the nocebo as a cause of death would have been deemed unethical and terminated before any data could have been recorded.

that's why homeopathy is ok in france.

I’m pretty sure coffee is a placebo effect. You assume drinking coffee gives you energy, so you feel better and more awake. But in reality you wake up by doing things, when you get up to go to work, getting up and moving around naturally wakes your body and mind up, not the morning coffee. That’s my theory at least.

So much pseudoscience in this video...