Placebo in Contemporary Medical Era: A Review

Abstract

Patients attribute their health to the medicine. The other side of the picture is that their health is just about what do they expect. Clinical efficacy of medicines needs the optimism from their patients. Placebo was analyzed, its activity in prefrontal cortex assessed, raising dopamine levels. Other Expectations of patients play vital role in bringing them back to healthy life, alongside medicine. This review summarizes the data of scientific findings under placebo context about placebo usage, neural action, psychosocial factors, patient doctor relationship, genetic polymorphism and expectancy or placebo induced well being in mental disorders. Placebo prescription is unethical in clinical practice, but clinical trials consider it as a back bone in drug development. Placebo provide scapegoat to practitioners when they can do nothing for patients. Placebo brings relief to patients. Issue regarding legality of placebo in clinical practice is resolved. So, its efficacy is properly judged. Clinical trials of each drug are done on volunteers, apart from health and ailment, on their viewpoints as pessimistic approach as well as optimistic approach. This will tell true drug efficacy.

Keywords: Placebo, Dopamine, Placebo effect, Clinical trials

Cite this Article

Seemab Amjad Fateh Khan, Batool Pirooz, Sarmad Ul-Haq. Placebo in Contemporary Medical Era: A Review. Research and Reviews: Journal of Medical Science and Technology (RRJoMST). 2015; 4(2): 39–47p.