Placebos are tricking you! Is there no secret ingredient?

What is the greatest and the most useful power you possess? If Voldemort ends up reading this (poor kid), he would say the 'Elder Wand'. To the mighty heroes in the Marvel Universe, the 'Infinite Gems'. What could it be to you and me? 

The mind! You must be feeling beatific, by now. Your brain has a great influence on everything- be it a minuscule paper cut on your palm or a cyst at a specific spot. How would your reaction be when I say: "There is something that could trick your mind..."?

If you were born in a family that grew up medical professionals, you might have some intriguing snippets of medical-related information in your hands. Everyone has a superficial thought on how drugs are tested. It's time to spill the beans...

Over the last few years, drug specialists are practising a new trend of testing a drug's effectiveness. New painkillers are verified for their standard through the double-blind placebo control trials. What exactly are these? 

In these trials, neither doctors nor patients know the actual drug and a fake one (it has no side-effects, anyway). At the time of result, two groups of patients are brought into a compare-and-contrast round. If the patients who had the real drug show some significant improvement than the inert ones, then the drug can be prescribed by the medical authority.

An example of a placebo ( a sugar pill)

Note that not every drug is tested this way. Most of the painkillers are tagged as 'worth prescribing' by these trials. Interesting, right? The fake drugs used for testing are called the placebos, which trick your brain to believe that they are the actual drugs, having a possible effect on the target site.

A placebo is a substance with no verified medical effects, such as sterile water, salt solution, or a sugar pill. It is a fake treatment which, in most of the cases, can produce a real response.

Your mind can heal your body just by belief. Your mind can trick you to believe that fake treatment can produce a real therapeutic result and the result of the placebos is called the placebo effect. The placebo effect is just more than positive thinking. Placebo is becoming a salient feature in anti-psychotic studies and antidepressants.

Belief is one of the oldest medicines known to mankind. The word 'placebo' in Latin means "I shall please." Placebo is more than religiously bound belief.

How does the placebo effect work?

The effect of placebos differs among people. The following have a great influence on the placebo effect:

• Kind of illness a person suffers from
• Patient's belief on the treatment
• Patient's vision on the response
• Doctor's positive feedback on the effectiveness of the treatment

In rare cases, few patients possess a genetic predisposition to respond highly to placebos. According to a study, patients who had a high-dopamine version of the gene in the prefrontal cortex of the brain showed a strong response to placebos than the vice versa. These patients have higher levels of pain perception. 

Researchers might be surprised to know that the placebo effect works but they regret this one: they are still trying ways to find how and why exactly it works. One possible explanation is that the placebos trigger the release of natural painkiller hormone in our body called endorphins. They work by binding to the opioid receptors in the brain to block the perception of pain.

Is there any possible side effect?

The response to a placebo is a double-edged sword. When a patient experiences some negative symptoms, it is called a 'nocebo effect'. Common symptoms are headache, giddiness or nausea.

Placebos, when used correctly, are beneficial when there is no therapeutically accepted treatment for an illness. 

But placebos are not the answer to every condition. By using placebos in research, scientists could get a gist on how the medication works and how drugs could be made safe and effective.

If you are a movie freak, it is much easier for me to explain the placebo effect. Check this out:

A kind of Placebo effect, in my opinion...

Note for the readers: Having known that you are aware of the placebos and their effect, you could no longer show any response to them. Even if you trick your brain to believe it, you would fail to do so. You would start to doubt the real ones too. I'm no way responsible for this...

Now, do you think placebos are good to be used? Is it advantageous to the world of medical science or just a pious fraud? Do you have any good example of the placebo effect?

Let me know you in the comment section.

Hashtags to be used:

#Placebos #PlaceboEffect #Psychology