Suppose you're a doctor, and a patient comes to you with a terminal condition. There is no known cure or effectual treatment, but patients given a placebo have been shown to feel significantly better about their health, and live slightly longer as a result. The catch is that the placebo effect (in this case) only works if the patient believes it's really a cure, rather than something to make them feel better.
What do you do?
Note: this is an ethical problem, which is why I've put it in Debates.
If someone cannot be saved I believe they have the right to know, yes a placebo may work in some instances, i think some studies have had success rates of 14% with placebo's although I dont think that was with terminally ill people. So for all those people you dont save, they have carried on living there lives thinking they are being cured then....... wham...... sorry life over....... no time to finish unfinished business, see your gran one last time, smell tulips, sleep with a hooker in amsterdam..... I dunno whatever your last thing you wanna do before you die is? That opportunity has been removed without your choice. Until placebo's are proven to have alot higher success rate I think its unethical to not tell the patient the truth.
Originally posted by AcolyteI've never heard of terminally ill patients receiving placebos.
Suppose you're a doctor, and a patient comes to you with a terminal condition. There is no known cure or effectual treatment, but patients given a placebo have been shown to feel significantly better about their health, and live slightly longer as a result. The catch is that the placebo effect (in this case) only works if the patient believes it's really ...[text shortened]... r.
What do you do?
Note: this is an ethical problem, which is why I've put it in Debates.
Maybe besides their regular medicines, with them in the full knowledge they're gonna die, they might receive something which will "Make them feel slightly better." (and that being a placebo), but I've never heard of them being given only placebo's or not being told they're terminal.
It is a very serious problem.
Doctors are supposed to heal people and are often not very well educated how to deal with terminal patients.
With terminal patients you need to make the switch from physical healing to mental healing. That asks for a totally different approach.
Insight, truth, compassion are some of the keywords that I can think of.
Fjord
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Originally posted by AcolyteIt's an interesting problem. Did you know that several large drug companies have put forward a proposal to exclude patients with known positive response to placebos from trials of their new drugs?
Suppose you're a doctor, and a patient comes to you with a terminal condition. There is no known cure or effectual treatment, but patients given a placebo have been shown to feel significantly better about their health, and live slightly longer as a result. The catch is that the placebo effect (in this case) only works if the patient believes it's really ...[text shortened]... r.
What do you do?
Note: this is an ethical problem, which is why I've put it in Debates.
I think on the contrary we should try to maximise the placebo effect. It would be a lot cheaper to cure everyone with aspirin.
Maybe when the doctor gives you some standard (50% working) cure for back pain he should say something like "This condition used to be really hard to treat, but theres this wonderful new drug that works on 99.9% of people - supplies are limited as its really expensive but I'm allowed 1 more prescription of it this year...".
Originally posted by AcolyteYou should find them a place on a clinical trial. Phase one trials are often conducted in terminally ill patients and provide vital information about dosages etc. And the patient will get a drug, or possibly a placebo, and either way will benefit at least from the placebo effect. The only moral qualm is over managing expectations, making people realise that there is only a 50 per cent chance (or whatever) of getting the experimental drug and that it's highly unlikely to provide a magic cure.
Suppose you're a doctor, and a patient comes to you with a terminal condition. There is no known cure or effectual treatment, but patients given a placebo have been shown to feel significantly better about their health, and live slightly ...[text shortened]... this is an ethical problem, which is why I've put it in Debates.
Rich.
Originally posted by AcolyteThere are four tiers to the answer.
Suppose you're a doctor, and a patient comes to you with a terminal condition. There is no known cure or effectual treatment, but patients given a placebo have been shown to feel significantly better about their health, and live slightly ...[text shortened]... this is an ethical problem, which is why I've put it in Debates.
Do you really care about the myth that living and life matter? Tier 1
Do you think that people agree with your view that prolonged life is good? Tier 2
Do you have a sense of "extra reality" in your "karmatic being" that allows you to think that 'attitude' is more powerful than physics? Tier 3
Do you have the right to be kind and distort inevitable truth... as a total friend to all... in order to 'lessen the burden' of the (soon to be) dead? Tier 4
I will be interested to see if anyone even recognizes this conversation.