Placebo measurement: a new approach

Abstract

Placebos are at the same time one of the most mysterious and familiar experiences that we all have. Who amongst has not felt relieved as we swallow a painkiller, sure in the knowledge that it will help? Conversely, the placebo is mysterious in that it suggests that what we think and feel has a large influence on how our body works, and whether or not it works well. The word placebo comes from a Psalm from the Bible, and it originally referred to people who mourned loudly and falsely at a funeral. Over the next few hundred years, the term placebo came to mean any medicine prescribed by a doctor more to please a patient than to actually cure them. Some authorities on the subject have claimed that until the 20th century, all of medicine was the placebo effect. Whatever the truth to that, the placebo was ignored until the ...