Tue, 27 Nov 2007
Placebo Effect and Meta Studies: What to make of them?
Some time ago, Bill sardi had pointed out this paper which questioned the whole
idea of the Placebo Effect. Now I just ran across
this slightly more recent
article in the NYT about another study which seems to be saying something
very similar. That is (if I understand it) that the so called Placebo Effect
is questionable and might be due to many other factors. And these factors
are frequently not taken into account but simply passed off as a placebo
effect. The research referenced in the articles is a meta study. That dreaded
kind of manipulative statistical based tool which seems so often to bring
forward heated debates and disagreements on a particular topic. Nutritionist
Niel Levin recently had this interesting blog entry referencing a Red Cross
paper warning of the high susceptibility to bias in these types of studies.
So what to make of the Placebo meta study? I'm not sure. The NYT article has an interesting ending. The author of the study says that he is not giving up on the placebo effect entirely but hopes that more research will bring forth the truth. That sounds like a guy without an agenda to me but I could be wrong.
I do think that many real effects which go against established thinking are discarded and explained away based on the idea that someone may only be experiencing a placebo effect. This is certainly true of vitamin C and the common cold. There is a large body of research suggesting no effect. But those of us who have used it can attest otherwise. And a close look at the bulk of the research reveals that most of it uses very small amounts and not in the protocol suggested by Pauling and others.
But my questions still remain. Is the placebo effect real? Are meta studies ever useful? Of course, I'm not a scientist or a doctor. So I'm really not qualified to say am I?
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