A chemically inert substance given instead of a drug.
Benefit may be gained from a placebo because the person taking it believes it will have a positive effect.
As the effectiveness of any drug may be partly due to this “placebo effect”, many new drugs are tested against a placebo preparation.
Any dummy medical treatment or intervention. Originally, a medicinal preparation having no specific pharmacological activity against the person’s illness or complaint and given solely for the psychophysiological effects of the treatment. More recently, a dummy treatment administered to the control group in a controlled clinical trial in order that the specific and non-specific effects of the experimental treatment can be distinguished.
Placebo is the Latin for ‘I will please’ and implies giving an inactive treatment. Traditionally, placebos were used to pacify without actually bene?ting the patient. They were inactive, often highly coloured, substances formerly given to please or gratify the patient but without pharmacological bene?t. Nowadays they are used in controlled studies, approved by ETHICS COMMITTEES and with patient consent, to determine the e?cacy of drugs.
However, pharmacologically inert compounds can relieve symptoms, and this is called the placebo e?ect. The reassurance that is associated with placebo administration is accompanied by measurable changes in body function which are affected through autonomic pathways and humoral mechanisms. Alterations in blood pressure and pulse frequency are especially common. Placebos have the ability to relieve a variety of symptoms in a consistent proportion of the population – in some studies in as many as 30 per cent. Some patients with symptoms such as pain or cough will respond to placebo medications, and an even higher proportion of patients with psychological symptoms such as anxiety or insomnia may bene?t. In judging the e?ectiveness of a drug, the comparison must be with a placebo rather than with no treatment at all.
An inert substance with no actual effect, but administration of which may produce a beneficial effect to help a patient (eg pain relief).
n. a medicine that is ineffective but may help to relieve a condition because the patient has faith in its powers. New drugs are tested against placebos in clinical trials: the drug’s effect is compared with the placebo response, which occurs even in the absence of any pharmacologically active substance in the placebo. Use of placebos in treatment is controversial, with some believing that such treatment compromises the patient’s *autonomy and compromises the virtue of honesty, thereby potentially undermining the doctor–patient relationship.
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