The production or enhancement of psychological or physical effects with the use of pharmacologically inactive substances administered under circumstances in which suggestion or expectation leads the subject to believe a particular effect will occur.
An improvement of a health condition that cannot be ascribed to the treatment used.
A physical or emotional change that occurs after a substance is taken but is not the result of any special effect of the substance.
A response to a placebo.
The apparently beneficial effect of telling someone that he or she is having a treatment, even if this is not true, caused by the hope that the treatment will be effective.
Change, usually beneficial, occurring after a substance (a placebo) is taken that is not the result of any property of that substance but usually reflects the faith or expectations that the person has in the substance.
Phenomenon of curing people without administering medication. Statistical tests have shown that sick people who have taken “sugar pills” tablets with no drugs in them but who are told that they have taken drugs often seem to recover, even though their diseases have not really been treated. In “blind trial” experiments, some patients are given healing medication, and others are given tablets with no medical value. The patients do not know that some of the tablets have no drugs. A significant number of those receiving the placebo recover anyway, apparently just by taking what they believe is medicine. This psychological factor in the treatment of disease is known as the placebo effect. Although doctors sometimes use the placebo effect to treat a patient, the effect is difficult to reproduce and many physicians regard it as a statistical anomaly.
Doctors have long noted that a patient’s attitude plays a significant role in his or her recovery. People who trust doctors and their medication stand a better chance of recovering faster and more completely than people who do not. This attitude plays an important role in the treatment of long-lasting diseases with no apparent cause, such as chronic pain. In some cases, chronic pain can be treated through the use of placebos. Pain is reduced because patients believe they will improve. As a result they become less anxious and more confident and their pain diminishes, even though they haven’t taken any therapeutic drugs. Some forms of medical treatment, such as homeopathy, rely almost entirely on this result for their effectiveness.
An apparently beneficial result of therapy that occurs because of the patient’s expectation that the therapy will help.