World Medical Association. When Are Placebo Controlled Trials Ethically Acceptable ? The World Medical Association has reaffirmed its view that in general it is ethically unacceptable to conduct placebo controlled trials if a proven therapy is available for the condition under investigation. Following a workshop of the European Agency for the Evaluation of Medicinal Products in London, Dr. Delon Human, Secretary General of the WMA, said that exceptions could be made in certain situations "where for compelling methodological reasons the use of placebo controlled trials are necessary to determine the safety and efficacy of drugs". Dr Human added: "A good example is where add-on treatment is being tested for the treatment of cancer, while the patients still receive their standard therapy.
Another situation is where research is done to find more effective treatments for a minor condition, such as baldness or allergic rhinitis. The WMA opposes the notion that the non-availability of drugs should be used as a justification to conduct placebo-controlled trials. Are the clinical effects of homoeopathy placebo effects A meta-analysis of ....pdf (application/pdf Object) SmallwoodReport.pdf (application/pdf Object) Half of all German doctors prescribe placebos, new study shows | Science. Half of German doctors prescribe placebos, according to a new study for the German Medical Association. The report says placebos, from vitamin pills to homeopathic remedies or even sham surgery, can prove highly effective in various treatments. In Bavaria, it found, 88% of GPs have sent patients home with prescriptions for placebo drugs.
The German Medical Association (BÄK), which commissioned the report, Placebos in Medicine, admitted that it doesn't fully understand how placebos work, but welcomed the report's findings. "Placebos have a stronger impact and are more complex than we realised. They are hugely important in medicine today," says Christoph Fuchs, the managing director of the BÄK. The report recommends that students and doctors should be taught about placebos and their usage. "Placebos can maximise the effect of medication," says Robert Jütte, author of the study and a BÄK board member.
It's also a question of trust. Ethically, however, placebos are still a grey area. Placebo. Statins have no side effects? What our study really found, its fixable flaws, and why trials transparency matters (again). Hi there, sorry to be absent (dayjob!). I was surprised to see a study I’m a co-author on getting some front page media play today, under the headline “Statins ‘have no side effects'”. That’s not what our paper found. But it was an interesting piece of work, with an odd result, looking at side effects in randomised trials of statins: specifically, and unusually, it compares the reports of side effects among people on statins in trials, against the reports of side effects from trial participants who were only getting a dummy placebo sugar pill.
The golden arse beam method. Ben Goldacre, The Guardian, Saturday 9 July 2011 Since I was a teenager, whenever I have a pivotal life event coming – an exam, or an interview – I perform a ritual. Placebo! Hi, two quick videos… one on the mighty placebo effect, via NHS Choices, one on the nocebo effect from Nerdstock. All bow before the mighty power of the nocebo effect. Ben Goldacre, Saturday 28 November 2009, The Guardian This week the parliamentary science and technology select committee looked into the evidence behind the MHRA’s decision to allow homeopathy sugar pill labels to make medical claims without evidence of efficacy, and the funding of homeopathy on the NHS.
There were some comedy highlights, as you might expect from any serious enquiry into an industry where sugar pills have healing powers conferred upon them by being shaken with one drop of the ingredient which has been diluted, so extremely, that it equates to one molecule of the substance in a sphere of water whose diameter is roughly the distance from the earth to the sun.
The man from Boots said he had no evidence that homeopathy pills worked, but he sold them because people wanted to buy them. Can a sugar pill have a side effect? Interestingly, a paper published in the journal Pain next month looks at just this issue. This is nothing new. Elsevier. Parliamentary Science and Technology Select Committee on homeopathy today. I gave evidence at the Parliamentary SciTech committtee today for their enquiry into whether the government had used scientific evidence properly in making their decisions about MHRA licenses for homeopathic pills, and homeopathy treatment on the NHS. This was a mini-enquiry as a result of interest expressed by the public, which is excellently democratic, you can see the whole thing online here, and some of it is quite good fun. www.parliamentlive.tv/Main/Player.aspx? MeetingId=5221 Personal highlights, from memory, include: Paul Bennett from Boots saying that there is no evidence showing homeopathy pills are effective at treating any conditions, but Boots are happy to sell them anyway, since the MHRA have given them a license.
One thing that will never get old for the homeopaths, it seems, is the old practise of pulling out a single trial and saying “ah, but look, pish to your meta-analyses, here is a trial where homeopathy works” . , or tweet this article to your friends. Player. Homeopathy. Podcast on government response to SciTech NHS homeopathy report I zipped off this quick podcast from my phone on Monday and put it on my secondary blog, which I run for scrappy stuff. People seemed to like it a bit so I’m reposting here. There’s more audio stuff coming, a bit of video too, and I’ll work out good feeds and iTunes stuff over the next couple of weeks. Cheery pip. Read the rest of this entry » The BBC have found someone whose cancer was cured by homeopathy Ladies and Gentlemen, we have hit the bottom of the barrel. Parliamentary Sci Tech Committee on Homeopathy Here’s the report, press release below. All bow before the mighty power of the nocebo effect Ben Goldacre, Saturday 28 November 2009, The Guardian This week the parliamentary science and technology select committee looked into the evidence behind the MHRA’s decision to allow homeopathy sugar pill labels to make medical claims without evidence of efficacy, and the funding of homeopathy on the NHS.
Hot foul air. BBC iPlayer - Pick of the Week: 16/10/2011. Sci9_mon_20080825. Placebo2001.pdf (application/pdf Object) Placebo.pdf (application/pdf Object) Beecher.pdf (application/pdf Object) Placebo.pdf (application/pdf Object)