Placebo – Overcome Your Body Weakness with Your Mind

The Placebo Effect – Is surgery always necessary?

As a Clinical Hypnotherapist I was delighted to discover an article in the Guardian recently regarding the placebo effect. It was about a leading surgeon who is claiming that many operations could be unecessary  (read here). I was particularly interested in this statement as hypnotherapy (for example; gastric band hypnotherapy and pain management) has gained significant success in recent years.

Prof Andy Carr is an orthopaedic surgeon at Oxford University Hospitals. He claims there are very few surgical procedures that have been tested against ‘dummy’ (placebo) operations. He states the reason for this is usually because of ethical concerns. Professor Carr even goes on to say that without these scientific tests, nobody can be sure if any procedure is safe, effective or even necessary. Rather worrying don’t you think? He goes on to say “The correct thing is . . . not to continue doing operations where we don’t know whether or not there’s a strong placebo component or an entire placebo component because that means that tens or hundreds of thousands of patients are having unnecessary operations.”

The success of elective surgery

There is significantly strong evidence to suggest that surgery that is planned in advance for non-emergency procedures is successful because of the high expectancy of the patient. This is especially true when the patient has volunteered for the surgery. Consequently, this may mean the benefits of surgery could be more in the mind of the patient. In other words in the ‘placebo effect’.

The ‘placebo effect’ as it is commonly known has been well documented in numerous studies and research since 1955 – my favourite of which was with a group of cancer patients. In this study, half the group was treated with chemotherapy and the other half with a placebo. All the people taking part in the study were told that they were receiving chemotherapy. Not surprisingly the group that was actually receiving chemotherapy presented all the usual side effects of the treatment, such as sickness, hair loss and so on. What is interesting is that every single person within the group which received the placebo also experienced the same side effects, as though they had received the chemotherapy. This phenonomen is just not possible by taking sugar pills. The results were conclusive. Because they believed they were receiving chemotherapy, their body reacted as though they had.

Now you would think something like this would be good news… music to our ears in fact! Because it shows that our minds are capable and in fact do reset and restore our bodies. Consider for a moment if you break a leg or other bone, or cut yourself, your brain starts the healing process. It does so by sending messages to your body to produce and send the relevant blood cells with healing agents to stop you from bleeding to death. All without a thought or intervention from you. A surgeon may set the leg so that it heals straight, or perform an operation, but your body will heal itself. Occasionally we may have to give support to our body through changing our mind-set. For we know through bio feedback that a positive mind-set has different brainwave frequencies than a negative mind-set.

So why isn’t there more talk more about the impact of the placebo effect in the medical world?

A good question! Especially in light of placebos performance in a significant number of cases supersedes that of pharmaceutical drug results. So why doesn’t the medical councils consider this option  particularly when considering the high cost of drugs to local GP surgeries? I’m asking why placebo treatment isn’t treated as a first option? If there is no improvement in the patient’s condition then prescribe drug treatment. After all, most of us accept that every drug has some risk attached to it. There are many people currently who are presribed a cocktail of drugs that have nothing to do with the initial problem. So often these drugs are prescribed to counteract the side effects of the treatment drug!

Prescriptions for anti-depressants are rising at a phenomenal rate in the UK. Unfortunately this seems to be the medical response to stress effects in people’s lives. A new study published recently is sure to set off another storm in the ongoing debate about the widespread prescription of antidepressants. In this study, Professor Irving Kirsch at the University of Hull and colleagues in the US and Canada report that new generation ‘SSRI’ antidepressants like Prozac or Seroxat mostly fall, “below the recommended criteria for clinical significance” (Kirsch et al. 2008). In other words, these modern drugs prescribed for depression generally don’t work.

So you can see why am I horrified at all this?

I am not denying that medical progress has saved lives and that in some cases drugs and surgery are necessary and do help. However, I feel we are at a crossroads.

I believe we have now entered a period where we are discovering more about the immense power of the mind. Even though we don’t yet fully understand how it works, we know that it does work.

Take the placebo effect. No one knows how it works – other than it has something to do with what a person believes… For example, if a person believes that a specific drug will help them recover, does it mean that the drug actually helps them recover? Or is it their belief in the drug that helps them recover? The placebo effect suggests it’s often the latter.

You see, the subconscious mind cannot tell the difference between reality and fantasy.

Norman Cousins said “Drugs are not always necessary, but belief in recovery always is”.

Thus being the case; our starting place is then our core belief system…and where belief is concerned, you and I cannot be neutral… for even disbelief is a form of belief.

More sugar anyone?

Success and Happiness

PS Please contact me if you have any questions about hypnotherapy, gastric band hypnotherapy or wish to discuss how hypnotherapy can help you.

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