Showing posts with label Placebo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Placebo. Show all posts

More on the placebo effect


The tablets contain absolutely nothing that can help medically, but yet they still work. A riddle and a phenomenon we see time and time again in the world of medicine. What matters is the patient's expectations. As you know, faith can move mountains-and is evidently important for man's ability to heal themselves.

They do not contain anything other than fillers and starch, but look like real tablets on a dot. The Placebo, cheat pills that primarily used in pharmaceutical research, so that you can compare with the impact of the ' genuine ' preparations. It is amazing is that cheat the medication in most cases have a demonstrable, positive impact. And not enough with that test subjects even show sign of getting better and improvement in their suffering – one can, in certain cases, prove that placebo's initiates healing, biochemical processes in the body. This happens when the test subject/patient think that he/she will be treated with an active substance. It is widely acknowledged that up to 50% of the impact by a genuine medication is due to placebo effect and by many diseases even more.

The power of faith
How is it possible that a ' false ' tablet may have the right effect? After logical, natural knowledge of scientific criteria, one cannot expect an effect. And yet the objectively measurable.

The so-called placebo effect is one of the most obscure and most exciting phenomena in the scientific world and is and has been the subject of many studies. Basically can effects of gene only lead to one conclusion: that the body's processes allow themselves to be influenced by the faith and the psychic setting-so much so that healing processes are possible.

It is a challenge for the science-based medicine, which so far has not given space in the sys-temet to "soul". And Pharmacology, which tests must be able to prove that the newly developed product has a clearly better effect than placebo. It does not always succeed. So many preparations will not be approved due to a negative comparison trials.

The phenomenon has been known since time immemorial. The Greek philosopher Plato was convinced that only the words have the power to cure diseases. He was also an advocate of the practice to make a seriously ill patient that healing is possible and probable. With the help of this well-intentioned lie to you could activate the body's ability to self healing and extend the life.

A first real proof of faith suggestive power found a Council under the leadership of Benjamin Franklin, naturalist and the progenitor of the u.s. Constitution. The French King, the Council asked to find proof of the so-called mesmerisme, who had come in vogue. The German physician Frantz Anton Mesmer claimed that in the body is a kind of ' fluid ', one by removing ' magnetism ' can influence. Benjamin Franklin was able to prove that the alleged effect alone was due to the imaginative force-not the method itself.


The Placebo effect and the "white coat"
Autosuggestion is the secret behind the placebo effect: the patient is convinced that the treatment works. If he/she suspects ' fraud ', the effect disappears immediately.

Experiments have shown that the placebo effect often have amazing expressions. Thus works small and me-get big tablets better than medium-sized and sprays work better than tablets. When it is the doctor who gives the sprayer, works better than when the nurse doing it. While price plays a role: A higher price offers greater placebo effect than a lower price. It is thought-provoking that placebopræpara-ter can even cause side effects such as headache, fatigue, grogginess, constipation or rash. Pla-ceboets effect hangs in addition together with the context, for example. If a doctor or than a Chief Medical Officer and participating in the treatment or prescribing placebo preparation. Here you will experience a com­ MONLY used version of a placebo effect and an equally important.

But if one with vile sugar balls and a good conversation with a doctor may relieve pain or accelerate the healing process, what are we going to with the medication? Fortunately for doctors and pharmacists, there are still a sufficient number of medications and treatments that works significantly better than placebo.

Anyway open placebo-research results new perspectives for treatment. Thus, it is an indispensable requirement for a good treatment that the doctor uses with complementary with mental care. Faith and confidence in the forces-and it is often essential for disease progression, particularly by chronic and/or severe diseases. Faith can move mountains – also when it comes to our health.

Shape size and color are essential for the effectiveness of a placebo preparation ' work ' It is because these external characteristics enable specific psychological processes. Capsules are often better than tablets.

The placebo effect


It feels as if the inside of your head will someone is playing a bass drum on. You swallow a few tablets, and hey presto the headache away. But the pills should not have have any effect. You are, in fact, been fobbed off with the same kind of calcium tablets, as medical science for years have used when they were supposed to test the efficacy of a new medicine against one which had no effect.

But if you feel that the pills work, you're not alone. To everyone's amazement, it is often in such placebo trials noted that up to 30 percent of those who only got calcium tablets, saw that the tablets actually worked.

When the medicine is tested, sharing one subjects in groups: a group that gets the medication, and a group who gets calcium tablets. None of the subjects know who gets what. On the effect of the medicine may need to be tested and checked. So far there has so far been medicine explanation of placebo effect. But it turns out that calcium tablets and also other kinds of placebo treatment-can have an impact on the immune system, if not directly, then indirectly. The immune system is not self-regulating. Recent studies suggest that many of the substances that are formed in the brain and in various hormone producing glands, also works on the immune defence cells.


A strong faith works positively
When calcium tablets can take effect, it is because the subjects think and hope so heavily on it, that their thoughts and feelings are translated into biological processes in the body.

The formation of substances in the central nervous system and the endocrine system, which stimulates the immune system. Exactly what is happening in the body, scientists do not know, but there is no longer any doubt that body and psyche works in on each other.

The doctor's shape is crucial
It is crucial, however, is not only treatment method. Very important is the doctor's appearance and manners. A doctor who exudes authority and seems optimistic in relation to the treatment, get more success with his treatment than a doctor who seems indifferent, insecure or untrustworthy.

Doctors and psychologists are working closely together to explore the placebo effect. We know inter alia from a u.s. trial of group therapy for women with relapse after a chest operation that the psyche may have crucial importance for a disease process. The women, who after the operation participated in self-help groups under pervision of a psychologist had far better survival rates and higher quality of life than women who are not consciously worked with psyche during the disease course.

In a major Danish research project at rigshospitalet in Copenhagen and Odense University Hospital is in the process of fake attempt. Here the researchers further by continuously trying to take blood samples from participants closer to demonstrate how the immune system is affected by the psyche.

Used most often in trials
Although placebo treatment is mainly used in the field of research, it happens that doctors at hospitals and in practice takes advantage of method or something, which is very close by. This despite the fact that it is not allowed to use placebo without the patients ' knowledge. An American study has shown that doctors at a hospital up to a few times per year used a placebo, either for pain-ridden patients to determine if their demands for more painkillers was real, or to so-called troublesome patients:

At home, there is no greater study of uses of placebos, but when some doctors, for example, uses vitamin B injections against fatigue, although vitamin B only has effect on B-vitamin deficiency, it must also be considered a form of placebo.

Although placebo treatment has been shown to be effective, the opponents believe that doctors breaks a fundamental moral rule, namely respect for the patient's autonomy and dignity. At the same time, it is discussed whether or not treatment is unethical or not. Is it unethical if the motive is to serve the patient best? And there is talk about deception, if treatment does not help?

Whether you are a supporter or not, then there is no doubt that the placebo effect actually exists. But how it works, and where powerful forces we are dealing with, we do not yet know. Some argue that placebo can cure serious diseases, while others believe that a placebo only can alleviate symptoms and exacerbate the effects of other therapies.

But there are huge prospects in research. If it manages to analyse carefully mechanisms, it will open to new methods of treatment and prevention-vel to mark methods without side effects.



Of the four known placebo treatments work surgery best.

Surgery
In an experiment with people who had heart problems, was one half the surgery, while the other is "only" was opened and closed-a so-called skin surgery. The latter half fared just as well as the first group who had undergone a real operation.

Injections
It is often salt water used for injections. There are good results with people who have asthma and allergies.

Contact
A, massaging gently in the place where it hurts, can have a positive effect. In General, physical contact is an expression of the physician's interest to his patient. The doctor may, for example, put his hand gently on an arm or back that gpr hurt.

Medicine
Calcium tablets can be given against pretty much anything. Studies show that calcium tablets in particular has a positive effect on migraine and headache patients. At the same time works large capsules better than small, red pills better than white pills, and many pills work better than just a single pill.