Placebo Effect, Placebo Effect Definition The placebo effect is one of the most exploited concepts in medicine. Many use it for various purposes, and each defines it differently. So, many people handle the black box of placebo effect concept while at the same time do not know its full content. There are many hypotheses, below are listed three: “the model expectations,” “opiate model” and “model of conditional reflexes.” But first, placebo effect is used: ● By the opponents of the alternatives when you want to say that something is not scientific, ie that it is “fraud”. ● When someone want to prove that something is effective. ● By researchers in a double-blind clinical experiments in order to aid their scientific evidence. It is absurd that what is accepted as scientific proof, is correlated with the placebo, where at the same time there is no clear and unique scientific evidence of placebo effect psychology. Most researches indicate that 30-40% of patients experienced a positive placebo effect. Friedman and Benson found the placebo to improve symptoms in 60 to 90% of the disease. We should be aware that there is no healing without a placebo effect. All medications in addition to its pharmacological effects also have a placebo effect, and it is difficult to separate these two effects (plavix is not an exception). Placebo effect examples should be used more consciously. It is very helpful in conventional and unconventional medicine, because it can greatly increase the percentage of positive effects of any therapy. It is important to note that with the current knowledge, we still cannot fully explain the mechanism of the placebo effect and the many “alternative healings”. There are no clear boundaries between what we believe placebo effect is and other mechanisms of healing. The concept of placebo, “we invented” that it can be classified in those mechanisms with self-healing forces of nature, which are not fully understood. As science and our knowledge progress in disclosing the secrets of nature, there will be fewer unknowns, so the black box of placebo effect will be reduced and we will explain how it works, along with some other “alternative therapies”. We stated before in some previous articles that our state of mind is very important, and in order to get the full placebo effect psychology we have to think positive. What we know is that auto-suggestion is the key of applying placebo effect on you. You have to believe that the medicine you are using will be helpful for you and help you with your problem, i.e. losing stress, fighting depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, etc.
Placebo Effect Definition According to Wolman, Dictionary of behavioral science, placebo effect definition is: ● A placebo is a substance that has no medical effect, but leads to the patient’s condition improvement because of his belief that the substance was effective. ● A substance that has no medical effect, and absorbed by the control group in experiment, while the experimental group receive active ingredient. This eliminates the impact of the act of substance absorption. (experimentally)
The word “placebo” comes from the Latin word “placer”, which means “I will pleasure.” In 19th century “placebo” gets the meaning of the drug, more so with the intent to satisfy the patient, but to heal him. Today’s doctors do the same when they give an antibiotic for some viral infections, so the patient would not have had the feeling that the doctor did nothing.
Get Your Placebo Now! Placebo Effect Psychology (three hypotheses): 1. “Model expectations” Studies show that expectations strongly influence how people react to taking a placebo, chemically active drug or treatment. Psychological theory explains how our thoughts, beliefs and positive thoughts can have an effect on improving health status. Sensory experience and thoughts of people have an impact on neurochemical reaction that leads to other changes in the biochemical system (response to hormonal and immune system). A new scientific discipline psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) studies the impact of various psychological states and behavior changes in the immune response and can provide many answers about the mechanism of action of the placebo effect. PNI is the study of two-way communication between the nervous, endocrine and immune systems. The same mechanism of many psychosomatic diseases due to negative attitudes and behaviors can be reversed with positive suggestions as a result of the placebo effect. Thus, we see how our thinking and mental life have an effect on neuro-immune biochemical changes, which affect the whole physical body and can lead to organic changes. This leads to the disease, but also in the opposite direction and healing. PNI provides answers to a placebo effect, but also many other positive results in healing that are the result of alternative therapies, because there are no clear boundaries between them. Negative expectations lead to so-called Nocebo effect, or deterioration. It is known that some patients in the experiment of the placebo group got medicamentous rash, or an allergic reaction, which was observed at the same time as a side effect in people who have really got biochemically active substances (Dodes). 80% of patients which instead of emetic (substance that causes vomiting) received fresh water, reacted by vomiting. There are even reports of addiction for some people on placebo. The expectations of the therapist and his faith in the efficacy of treatment, and physiological response to reducing the anxiety of the patient are important elements of the placebo effect. 1. “The model of conditional reflex” It is a learned response to medical intervention. Previous experience improvement from taking the pill, act as a conditioned stimulus (compare with the stimulus of a bell in Pavlov’s famous experiment). This means that every next contact with the doctor or taking a new pill triggers a reflex process improvement that is the placebo effect. Experiment: The dog was with the ring tone receiving injections of acetylcholine, which has the effect of lowering blood pressure. Successive repetition of the sound and injection of acetylcholine has created a conditioned response: the dog lowered blood pressure when he heard the bell, even when did not receive injections. Interesting is the further course of the experiment. To a dog, who developed the conditional reflex to the sound of bells was given an injection of adrenalin, which has a function to raise the pressure. The outcome was unexpected. With the sound of bells, a dog’s pressure fell, instead of raising the adrenaline, since it was the primary function of adrenaline injection. So the placebo effect was stronger than the pharmacological action of adrenaline injection. New neuron connection were created that led
to different internal neurochemicals response, which has prevailed over substance which was initiated externally. 1. “Opiate model» In the placebo stimulus endorphins are released in order to reduce pain. Donald Price and his colleagues showed that the effects of placebo-induced analgesia (insensitivity to pain), can disappear if given naloxsone, antagonist of opiates (endorphins).
Define Placebo Effect “Everyone knows what is placebo, until the moment they have to answer.” (Shapiro, Brodi) The term placebo is used in science, often as a final argument to persuade or deny whether an alternative treatment works or not, while no one knows how to define placebo effect. It is often said that one effect is only a result of auto-suggestions and on this the discussion ends, and in fact no one asks about the placebo effect psychology. We should be aware that there is no healing without placebo. The placebo effect is present in every process of healing, whether it is driven by a warm conversation, acupuncture, homeopathic medicine, allopathic medicine or surgical treatment. Therefore when someone comes for help, starts taking the medicine or accepts treatment, the patient carries some degree of positive beliefs that the problem will be cured. The belief, expectation drives the placebo effect, or how we say often “self-healing”. Big positive expectation make placebo effect bigger, therefore a patient increases his chances of self healing. Placebo effect is a medicine that works! Copyright from FeelGoodTime.net All rights reserved.