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Placebo deception and without irritable bowel syndrome

published in PLoS December
The placebo works even without deceit.
study in patients with irritable bowel syndrome.

The placebo in clinical trials is typically used as a control to test potential new drugs. In these studies, patients are divided into two groups (drug vs placebo) and the data analyzed to see whether the pharmacological effect is greater than that of placebo. Often the data point to a therapeutic response in those who take pills that do not contain active ingredients. The placebo data are so convincing that many doctors (one study estimates 50% in the U.S.) secretly administered placebo in patients unaware.
As this deception is ethically questionable, Ted Kaptchuk and colleagues, evaluated the power of placebo in an honest and respectful. The researchers, belonging all'Osher Research Center Researchers at Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, studied 80 patients with irritable bowel syndrome , dividing them into two groups. A group that served as a control did not receive any medication, the other has knowingly received placebo. Kaptchuk illustrating how the study says, "Not only did we make it quite clear that the tablets were sugar pills without the active ingredient, but we also say 'placebo' labels' . Patients were followed for 3 weeks. At the end of the observation period almost twice as many patients treated with placebo showed a significant improvement in symptoms than the control group (59% vs 35%) . In addition, other clinical parameters, improvement rates were comparable to those obtained with the most powerful drugs against irritable bowel syndrome.
the authors caution that this study simply opens the door to the notion that the placebo is also effective in the patient fully informed. Although larger studies are needed, these results suggest that treatment with placebo even when administered without hiding with a plausible rationale of potential effects, may produce a beneficial response .

Placebos Without Deception: A Randomized Controlled Trial in Irritable Bowel Syndrome
Kaptchuk TJ et al. PLoS ONE 5 (12): e15591 .