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Meaningful Placebos — Controlling the Uncontrollable

List of authors.
  • Daniel E. Moerman, Ph.D.

In this issue of the Journal, Wechsler et al.1 report data from a study that compared four interventions involving patients with asthma (ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT01143688). They found that three of the interventions — active albuterol, sham albuterol, and sham acupuncture — were all equally effective in controlling asthma symptoms, as judged by patient-reported improvement. In contrast, lung function was improved only in those given active albuterol, as measured by an increase in the forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV1). The fourth intervention was “no treatment,” in which patients were told to wait for several hours and then . . .

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Funding and Disclosures

Disclosure forms provided by the author are available with the full text of this article at NEJM.org.

Author Affiliations

From the University of Michigan–Dearborn, Dearborn.