EiR Blog

An article on WebMD this week addressed a very interesting issue. Should doctors give patients placebo (non-active) pills in any circumstances. It turns out this is a surprisingly common practice when doctors are faced with poorly understood chronic conditions such as fibromyalgia. A recent survey revealed that more than half of doctors give out fake prescriptions to patients and that the majority of doctors feel this practice is OK. Scientists questionned  679 internists and rheumatologists; doctors working in specialties where they often see patients with chronic illnesses or chronic pain syndromes including fibromyalgia that are difficult, and in many cases imposible, to cure. It was revealed that doctors find that placebos often provide significant benefit to such patients. The placebo effect is something that has been known of for a long time and is in fact an integral part of scientific research. It is central to the gold standard of medical...