Liječnički vjesnik, Vol. 134 No. 7-8, 2012.
Review article
PLACEBO IN THE PAIN TREATMENT
Slavica Kvolik
Marko Jukić
Mira Fingler
Abstract
Use of medical preparations having no specific pharmacological activity or dummy procedures administered to patients is known as placebo. Such maneuvers are important in the pain treatment and clinical studies investigating pain mechanisms. Several recent studies have shown that placebo treatment produces measurable psychophysiological effects, characterized by changes in specific brain functions and decreased subjective pain perception. This article reviews changes observed in placebo analgesia, its intensity as compared to active compounds, and principal problems observed during the placebo treatment and in clinical trials.
Keywords
Pain – drug therapy, psychology; Analgesics – therapeutic use; Placebos – therapeutic use, pharmacology; Placebo effect; Brain – drug effects; Pain measurement – drug effects; Ethics, clinical
Hrčak ID:
172438
URI
Publication date:
27.8.2012.
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