The placebo effect is a phenomenon in which a person's symptoms or well-being improve after receiving a fake treatment that has no specific or intrinsic effect on their condition.
For example, a person may feel less pain after taking a sugar pill that they believe is a painkiller, or they may feel more energetic after receiving an injection of saline soluti ... Show More
Apr 2020
Will a placebo boost my sports performance?
<p>In medicine, it’s long been recognised that a placebo, a sham medicine or treatment, can have a powerful positive effect on a patient’s health. Part of that effect relies on a person’s belief that an inactive substance or treatment (for example, a sugar pill) is in fact an act ... Show More
26m 27s
Feb 2022
23. Is the Placebo Effect for Real?
In Latin, the word “placebo” means “I shall please.” In the medical world, placebos mean something … well, a little different. Bapu Jena walks us through the thorny world of placebo research and the implications the placebo effect can have for patients. Hosted by Simplecast, an A ... Show More
36m 18s
Nov 2023
Jeremy Howick, "The Power of Placebos: Unlocking Their Potential to Improve Health Care" (Johns Hopkins UP, 2023)
Should your doctor prescribe a placebo for you, instead of conventional medicine? And if she did, would it work? Is the double-blind placebo-controlled paradigm really the gold standard for medical research?
Placebos are the most widely used treatments in the history of medicine. ... Show More
34m 56s