Placebo Effect Essay Example
Feda Aziz
Amy Blitchok
ENG 1060-0013
April 30, 2012
Placebo over Mind
For years, scientists and researchers have sought to find an explanation for the placebo effect. What many scientists and researchers do not realize is that placebo or “fake medicine” has been used as early as the revolutionary period in the seventeen hundreds. The mind is a powerful organ, in which controls all our body’s functions and thoughts. Everyday functions such as breathing and walking relies heavily on the most important part of our organ: the mind. However, through the use of placebos, it is becoming clear that the mind may have an even greater influence on our daily lives, influencing our perception of well- being. The placebo, which is Latin for “to please,” is a sugar-pill that can be taken in many different forms such as injection, liquid intake or by pill. Research conducted by physicians and scientists on placebos revealed that patients who receives treatment for asthma, irritable bowel syndromes, knee surgery and much more showed improvements and are symptom free which in turn demonstrated how mind is more powerful than the body.
The Placebo effect is when the administration of some entirely harmless or inactive drug or pill seems to make people better. It can also reduce the experience of pain by blocking pain signals in the spinal cord from arriving at the brain in the first place. When patients expect a treatment to be effective, the brain area responsible for pain control is activated, causing the release of natural endorphins. The endorphins send instructions down to the spinal cord to suppress incoming pain signals and patients feel better whether or not the treatment had any direct effect. This article explained how the mind and placebo work together in sending messages from the brain to the area of pain. Other problems exist in testing placebos' effectiveness. They cannot be used in studies on life-threatening or degenerative illnesses, since taking an inactive
Amy Blitchok
ENG 1060-0013
April 30, 2012
Placebo over Mind
For years, scientists and researchers have sought to find an explanation for the placebo effect. What many scientists and researchers do not realize is that placebo or “fake medicine” has been used as early as the revolutionary period in the seventeen hundreds. The mind is a powerful organ, in which controls all our body’s functions and thoughts. Everyday functions such as breathing and walking relies heavily on the most important part of our organ: the mind. However, through the use of placebos, it is becoming clear that the mind may have an even greater influence on our daily lives, influencing our perception of well- being. The placebo, which is Latin for “to please,” is a sugar-pill that can be taken in many different forms such as injection, liquid intake or by pill. Research conducted by physicians and scientists on placebos revealed that patients who receives treatment for asthma, irritable bowel syndromes, knee surgery and much more showed improvements and are symptom free which in turn demonstrated how mind is more powerful than the body.
The Placebo effect is when the administration of some entirely harmless or inactive drug or pill seems to make people better. It can also reduce the experience of pain by blocking pain signals in the spinal cord from arriving at the brain in the first place. When patients expect a treatment to be effective, the brain area responsible for pain control is activated, causing the release of natural endorphins. The endorphins send instructions down to the spinal cord to suppress incoming pain signals and patients feel better whether or not the treatment had any direct effect. This article explained how the mind and placebo work together in sending messages from the brain to the area of pain. Other problems exist in testing placebos' effectiveness. They cannot be used in studies on life-threatening or degenerative illnesses, since taking an inactive