The placebo effect

[Guest guest]

 

 

Interesting implications, indeed.

 

At the very end of the Washington Post piece there was this pithy little

comment:

 

" Wray said researchers should also look for cheaper and safer ways to harness

the placebo effect. 'If it has no risk and it makes [patients] better, we

ought to be studying what it is and how to use it every day, ethically,' she

said. "

 

It is the only real acknowledgement in a piece entirely about the so-called

" placebo effect " that no one has much of an idea of what this phrase means,

what dynamics are implied, or how such dynamics might be " harnassed " .

 

Earlier in the article, the " placebo effect " is defined as " the improvement

that people get from a treatment because they expect it to work. " But this

seems more than a little incomplete, given the complex of issues involved.

 

One of the interesting implications of this

to me is the effect on the practice of medicine

of the widespread use of poorly defined terms.

 

More fundamentally, it suggests that

language and cognition are far more

potent aspects of medical intervention

than has been widely acknowledged until

the present.

 

I made the acquaintence recently of

an Italian MD and professor of philosophy

named Aldo Stella who has written a book

about the nature of the role of language

and cognition in medicine. Stella's

wide range of experience both as an

MD and as a philosopher of science

gives him an interesting perspective

that is clearly developed in this book.

 

We talked about the pertinence of such

investigations to the integration of

Chinese medical theories and practices

in Western societies, and Stella pointed

out that at the level of philsophy there

is a great common ground bewteen his

work in researching the cognitive

science of medicine and ancient Chinese

thought.

 

I hope to see an English translation

of his work soon so that folks who

don't read Italian can gain a better

understanding of these issues.

 

Ken