What Is a Placebo Used For?

Placebos, sometimes referred to as sugar pills, are inert medical treatments that work simply because the user believes they will. These treatments come in the form of pills, drips, creams, or the false assurance that a treatment has been used. Once a user believes they are being treated, many ailments will begin to correct themselves. This phenomena, referred to as the placebo effect, has a variety of practical uses.

Use in Medicine

• Prescribing placebos in practice can be a dangerous strategy. Their use may delay the discovery of serious symptoms, and the relief they provide comes slowly compared to true medicine. Additionally, some individuals are immune to the placebo effect. Despite these risks, many physicians continue to regularly prescribe them. Vitamins, for example, are frequently given as an illusion of treatment for minor symptoms. Placebo prescriptions are also used to avoid giving actual drugs to patients without true medical need. While placebos do have a practical role in medicine, they are used with great caution.

Controversy in Medical Use

• The risks associated with prescribing placebos for medical use have created controversy. Opponents argue that doctors who use placebos are breaching the Hippocratic Oath, a promise by physicians to do no harm. This perceived harm comes from the possibility of a reduced trust in doctors after discovering the deception, and the chance that patients avoid further treatment because of a false belief that they have received medicine. Furthermore, selling fake pills for the price of regular medicine can be considered a form of fraud.

Use in Birth Control

• Placebos are also used in several other niche areas. Birth control prescriptions, for example, come with several inert pills. Because women on birth control are advised not to use the pill during their menstrual cycle several placebos are provided for those days. In this case the placebos are not intended to fool the body, but instead to help the user keep in the habit of taking a daily pill. It has been found that including these extra inert pills in a prescription of birth control successfully increases the rate of proper use.

Use in Research

• After developing a new medical treatment researches are tasked with figuring out just how well it works. To accomplish this, one group of subjects will be given the newly developed medicine while another receives a placebo. In a double-blind study, the evaluator does not know which group received the placebo until he has evaluated the results. This prevents bias from affecting the process for the patients and the research evaluator.

When to Avoid Placebos

• Individual differences and a variety of other factors come into play when deciding to use a placebo. Variables such as ethnicity, age, and specific diseases are all important. Severe burn victims, for example, can benefit greatly from a placebo being given under the name of morphine. Alternatively, Alzheimer patients are completely immune to the effect because of their impaired cognitive abilities. Physicians must also be careful to use deception with caution. A patient in great pain, regardless of the legitimacy of their claim, should not be given a placebo. Furthermore, a physician should follow up on patients with placebos to ensure the symptoms have dissipated rather than remaining untreated.