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A fascinating new article in knowable magazine https://www.knowablemagazine.org/article/mind/2017/rebranding-placebos
Indicates that a group of savvy scientists are looking at the potential for placebo as a front line therapy for a host of illnesses and conditions.
The article is rather long, but to summarize, placebo and its related effects are powerful. So powerful in fact that most medical therapies are only slightly more effective, while running the risk of serious side effects. Therefore the scientists pose the questions. Why not use placebo as a front line therapy, a first line of defense in most cases?
But for this to work, placebo would need a rebrand.
The problem with the placebo effect is that it stops working once a person knows that they are receiving the placebo.
So here is a thought. What if instead of using the word "placebo", we make it ok for doctors to write initial prescriptions for monosaccharide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monosaccharide and Dihydrogen Monoxide DHMO therapy https://www.lockhaven.edu/~dsimanek/dhmo.htm and / or other fancy chemical names for the ingredients actually in these placebos. Then a simple updating of wikipedia pages showing their efficacy in treatment of various ailments along with their relative safety. In otherwords, since we are a society that places our faith in chemicals, why not just give the chemicals in the placebos their due and forget the word "placebo" all together?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Wednesday February 27 2019, @10:36PM (2 children)
But you can't give placebos to people and have them work for a couple different reasons.
1) If you tell them "take 3 placebos every 4 hours" the vast majority of people will know it's a sugar pill and does nothing.
2) If you give them a placebo and *tell them* it's something else, how is that not unethical? Lying to your patient about how you're treating them?
2a) If they see another doctor who thinks they're on Real Medication A and treat them accordingly, you run the risk of the interactions between Real Medication B and Real Medication A(*actually placebo) not behaving as expected, and causing other problems with the patient. Or the doctors have to communicate to each other which medications are placebos, in which case the patient keeps "shopping around" until they find an HONEST doctor who will just tell them whether they're taking placebos.
3) If you come up with some other name like "dihydrogen monoxide", then people go straight to the Google to look up whether it's a real medicine.
3a) Even worse, now there will be an argument online about whether every medication is "a REAL medication." Imagine homeopathy, only now the deniers actually have a real argument behind them.
It's an interesting thought experiment, but I just don't see an ethical way to make it work.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 28 2019, @05:12PM (1 child)
Doctor: "Go to the pharmacy and order Compound ZAXRO. Here is your prescription. Studies have shown that for most patients, it shows a substantial reduction of pain. If it doesn't work, let me know, and we can move on to stronger drugs. I don't want to start you on those, though, because they have more noticeable side effects and are a lot more expensive."
This can be done in an ethical way... although it'd need to be carefully watched. As you allude to, it'd be really easy for this to become an abusive snake-oil salesman trick.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday February 28 2019, @07:49PM
I don't know about most people, but personally, if I knew there was a significant chance I was just being prescribed a placebo, I would have the craving to look it up online to see whether I was on a real medication or not. I wouldn't be okay with just shrugging and saying, "meh, doctors know best," especially considering how big of dicks big pharma is already.
How would you feel if you were being charged $400a pill (or whatever) for a placebo?
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"