Placebo Effect

Abstract

Discussion of the placebo is complicated because different people who use the term have different concepts of what it means. In fact there are several meanings. The derivation of the term is from the Latin verb placere, to please. Placebo is the future indicative, meaning “I shall please.” Referring to the doctor-patient relationship, placebo has generally been used to indicate that, in the absence of a specific therapy for the disease, the physician intends to please or to satisfy the patient’s need for symptomatic relief by giving either an inert substance or a nonspecific treatment that would be palliative at best. A placebo response should be entirely explainable by processes that are triggered by the patient’s expectation and not by a direct somatic benefit of the treatment itself. In other words, the beneficial effect is a result of the patient’s mental activity.