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The potential benefit of the placebo effect in sham-controlled trials: implications for risk-benefit assessments and informed consent
There has been considerable debate surrounding the ethics of sham-controlled trials of procedures and interventions. Critics argue that these trials are unethical because participants assigned to the control group have no prospect of benefit from the trial, yet they are exposed to all the risks of t...
Autores principales: | , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
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BMJ Publishing Group
2013
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3812890/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23239742 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/medethics-2012-101045 |
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author | Brim, Remy L Miller, Franklin G |
author_facet | Brim, Remy L Miller, Franklin G |
author_sort | Brim, Remy L |
collection | PubMed |
description | There has been considerable debate surrounding the ethics of sham-controlled trials of procedures and interventions. Critics argue that these trials are unethical because participants assigned to the control group have no prospect of benefit from the trial, yet they are exposed to all the risks of the sham intervention. However, the placebo effect associated with sham procedures can often be substantial and has been well documented in the scientific literature. We argue that, in light of the scientific evidence supporting the benefits of sham interventions for pain and Parkinson's disease that stem from the placebo effect, these sham-controlled trials should be considered as offering potential direct benefit to participants. If scientific evidence demonstrates the positive effect of placebo from sham interventions on other conditions, sham-controlled trials of interventions for the treatment of these conditions should be considered to have prospects of benefit as well. This potential benefit should be taken into account by research ethics committees in risk-benefit analyses, and be included in informed consent documents. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-3812890 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2013 |
publisher | BMJ Publishing Group |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-38128902013-10-31 The potential benefit of the placebo effect in sham-controlled trials: implications for risk-benefit assessments and informed consent Brim, Remy L Miller, Franklin G J Med Ethics Research Ethics There has been considerable debate surrounding the ethics of sham-controlled trials of procedures and interventions. Critics argue that these trials are unethical because participants assigned to the control group have no prospect of benefit from the trial, yet they are exposed to all the risks of the sham intervention. However, the placebo effect associated with sham procedures can often be substantial and has been well documented in the scientific literature. We argue that, in light of the scientific evidence supporting the benefits of sham interventions for pain and Parkinson's disease that stem from the placebo effect, these sham-controlled trials should be considered as offering potential direct benefit to participants. If scientific evidence demonstrates the positive effect of placebo from sham interventions on other conditions, sham-controlled trials of interventions for the treatment of these conditions should be considered to have prospects of benefit as well. This potential benefit should be taken into account by research ethics committees in risk-benefit analyses, and be included in informed consent documents. BMJ Publishing Group 2013-11 2012-12-13 /pmc/articles/PMC3812890/ /pubmed/23239742 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/medethics-2012-101045 Text en Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://group.bmj.com/group/rights-licensing/permissions This is an Open Access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 3.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/ |
spellingShingle | Research Ethics Brim, Remy L Miller, Franklin G The potential benefit of the placebo effect in sham-controlled trials: implications for risk-benefit assessments and informed consent |
title | The potential benefit of the placebo effect in sham-controlled trials: implications for risk-benefit assessments and informed consent |
title_full | The potential benefit of the placebo effect in sham-controlled trials: implications for risk-benefit assessments and informed consent |
title_fullStr | The potential benefit of the placebo effect in sham-controlled trials: implications for risk-benefit assessments and informed consent |
title_full_unstemmed | The potential benefit of the placebo effect in sham-controlled trials: implications for risk-benefit assessments and informed consent |
title_short | The potential benefit of the placebo effect in sham-controlled trials: implications for risk-benefit assessments and informed consent |
title_sort | potential benefit of the placebo effect in sham-controlled trials: implications for risk-benefit assessments and informed consent |
topic | Research Ethics |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3812890/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23239742 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/medethics-2012-101045 |
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