Navigating the Placebo Effect: An In-Depth Look at Its Efficacy and Limitations

2024-01-29 16:52:30

It would be nice: If we have a health problem, we no longer have to accept the disadvantages of a medication or other therapies, but rather rely on the placebo effect in the future. Just believe in it and it will happen again!

Unfortunately it’s not that simple. The placebo effect doesn’t really “work”, it just makes us believe that something works. Nothing wrong with positive thinking. Looking to the future with hope, even when the present may not be casting a particularly rosy light on the days to come, is something deeply human. And in many cases it pays off.

Placebo effect: close your eyes and get through?

This is also the case with the placebo effect, depending on how large it is and how long it lasts. To overcome a more or less short phase, sometimes even a good solution for non-dangerous illnesses that last for a short time. Plasters also have a kind of placebo effect (plus distraction) on small children who cry more from the shock of having fallen than because of the barely visible scratch. A plaster, especially a colorful one, often stops tears, as parents and grandparents know.

But with a chronic disease like multiple sclerosis? Do we really want to wait until the symptoms are noticeable again or simply until we admit that the initial improvement was perhaps just a subjective illusion? And for as long as possible, avoid other therapies, be it (symptomatic) medication or physiotherapy?

And what does “without side effects” mean? If you have to pay tens of thousands of euros to possibly only achieve a placebo effect that will soon “wear off” again, that is also an expensive side effect.

Clear statements instead of vague “knowledge”

Science works without deception. She wants to clearly state what works and what doesn’t. This is why, for example, active ingredients are tested in studies (along with other active ingredients) in comparison to placebo. Neither doctors nor patients know who is taking a placebo and who is taking the active ingredient. About faith and deception, about everything that is as vague and unclear as possible, about all subjective expectations, in order to rule out pure wishful thinking from the outset.

With a tablet or an infusion, the active ingredient and placebo can be easily randomized and blinded. It becomes much more difficult, for example, when comparing diets. After all, the test subject notices whether he or she is eating a piece of ham or broccoli and whether the plate is half or completely full. It will be interesting (certainly but not impossible) if an electrode suit like the Mollii Suit is tested in a randomized and blinded manner. That’s what Prof. Mathias Mäurer would like from the manufacturer of the suit. In order to be able to say very clearly afterwards: it works or it doesn’t work. More on this in his