this post was submitted on 14 Nov 2023
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Wait, if it's double-blind, wouldn't the scientists be unaware of whether he got a placebo or the real drug? Although I suppose this could be after the study has concluded. I would bet that in real studies they record the side effects reported before checking to see if it was the placebo or not!
This is basically like the many tests done on gluten sensitivity, where the people who claimed to have it and thought they were given bread claimed the usual symptoms, when they weren't given anything of the sort. (And vice versa when they were given something they thought had no gluten, but did, and had no ill effects afterwards).
What's really crazy is that sometimes the placebo can still bring people relief even after knowing that it's a placebo
I recommend that everyone swallow a tictac placebo every day for exactly this reason. It cures everything.
No you should buy my snakeoil for that
But does it come in a big bottle?
Yeah. Though you ethically can't try to use placebo as a medical treatment, because it's inconsistent in whether it does anything and is essentially trying to not treat the patient at all with known methods of treatment.
It is not completely excluded. For cases where the 'standard' treatment did not work or does not exist, placebo treatment can be used under the condition, that the patient is informed that they will be given placebo.
There could are trials on healthy people.
And the larger the pill, the better the placebo effect. That’s why we now have testicle sized pills.
Good news! It's a suppository.
Somewhat unrelated, but the biggest pills I take aren't even the medicine, but are the supplements to make up for the loss the medicine causes.
Yep. Some are just so freaking big. I would rather take two smaller pills than one throat size. Talk about perfect fit…
I wish that worked for me. I’d love to have someone give me a BS miracle drug sugar pill and actually be able to believe them. Even subconsciously. But subconsciously, I automatically disbelieve miracle claims (and even most efficacy claims) until looking at the clinical trial data.
Years of chronic pain and gobs of different meds to control it, most entirely ineffective but with side effects, does things to a person already inclined toward doubt. I’m also prone to nocibo responses, like the guy in the comic, but I think it’s sensations that are always there, I’m just being asked not to ignore the state of my body like I usually do, so I actually notice them.
If you know that placebo works, and know that it is placebo, then of course!
You just described the placebo effect.
No he didn't. You don't have to know that you're taking a placebo for it to be a placebo. You just have to know you took something. Most people think the placebo affect is negated once it is revealed you have taken a placebo. His comment highlighted that the effect can persist despite ones knowledge that it is a placebo.
Just remember that the placebo effect is only effective in a small percentage of the population, and is consistent with any other substances that may induce this phenomenon. That's how they know when something actually works...it works in the majority of people, not just that small percentage.
Yeah that's not quite it. Placebo is actually present for most/the majority of people, but they (researched of various kinds )are looking for effects that are above and beyond the level demonstrated by the placebo alone.
One fun thing to think about is that most (maybe all) treatments include some degree of placebo effect inherently.
Sure, but that's just the placebo effect? I thought the double-blind process referred to something else in particular (hence the "double" part of the blind):
In any case, I was mostly just curious, don't intend to nit-pick the title :)
[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK546641/
Source?
This is all I could find on the subject:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25583468/
And:
So there’s definitely debate in the community about it, I would love to see some of these many tests done to prove it was not being caused by gluten if you could point me in the right direction, I’d appreciate it.
Here's one of the well known examples: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23648697/
It should be noted that I'm not saying there's no evidence for a non-celiac response. Just that all the evidence for it being gluten is minimal to non-existent. FODMAPs are one of the primary areas of focus at the moment as actually being responsible and all the claims about it being gluten largely being misinformation that is being socially perpetuated.
Great source, thanks.
So it’s more like all this time people were just guessing it was the gluten and it kinda fell into popular culture and now we have to fight against that?
Basically. Especially since if it is FODMAPs, that's an entirely different profile of foods to be concerned about that only partially overlap with gluten foods.
Both of the scientists are actually legally blind so this all still checks out
Single blind studies do exist though... For some reason.
If the experimenter never really interacts with the participants and there is no subjective measurement being made there isn't really any benefit to being double blind, it's just overhead at that point
Well then, how will they gloat and laugh in the participant's face like in the comic?
And they’re two scientists so it’s really double single blinded win!
Yes, I think some treatments cannot be done without the scientist knowing.