BACKGROUND Nocebo effect is the occurrence of troublesome symptoms after the administration of inert substances. It can be easily studied during blind oral challenges for drug reactions, which always involve the administration ofa placebo. METHODS We collected data about nocebo effect in outpatients undergoing oral drug challenge. Patients with previous documented adverse reactions to drugs u...

Herbal medicines are often perceived by the general public as a “soft” alternative to Western Medicine, but the use of these substances can be risky since they can induce nocebo effect [1]. In 1961 Walter Kennedy chosen the term nocebo (Latin for I will harm) as the counterpart of placebo [2]. This term was introduced a few years after Henry Beecher published his paper on the placebo effect [3]...

Introduction. The nocebo effect consists in delivering verbal suggestions of negative outcomes so that the subject expects clinical worsening. Several studies indicate that negative verbal suggestions may result in the amplification of pain. Amplification style is one of the most important dimensions in psychosomatic research. Methods. One group of pain therapy unit patients was evaluated at ba...

Previous studies suggest that nocebo effects, sometimes termed "negative placebo effects," can contribute appreciably to a variety of medical symptoms and adverse events in clinical trials and medical care. In this study, using a within-subject design, we combined functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and an expectation/conditioning manipulation model to investigate the neural substrates...

The nocebo effect is the onset of untoward reactions following the administration of an indifferent substance. The oral challenge with alternative drugs plays a central role in the management of drug allergy and the use of inert substances is part of this procedure. We evaluated the occurrence and clinical characteristics of nocebo effect in patients with adverse drug reactions. Six hundred pat...

A wealth of research shows that the expectancy to improve, either by verbal suggestion or by learning experiences, results in less pain and suffering [8]. There are also intriguing studies showing the relevance and usefulness of placebo in clinical settings [4]. Far less research is available on the reverse, the nocebo effect. Overall, results of these studies are concordant with the placebo re...

INTRODUCTION Placebo and nocebo represent complex and distinct psychoneurobiological phenomena in which behavioural and neurophysiological modifications occur together with the application of a treatment. Despite a better understanding of this topic in the medical field, little is known about their role in physiotherapy. PURPOSE The aim of this review is: a) to elucidate the neurobiology behi...

OBJECTIVE Choice may be an important influence on the effectiveness and side effects of medical treatments. PURPOSE We investigated the impact of having a choice of medication compared to no choice on both nocebo and placebo responding. METHODS Sixty-one participants were randomly assigned to either choose between or be assigned to one of the two equivalent beta-blocker medications (actuall...

The purpose of the present study was to examine placebo and nocebo effects under hypnotic analgesia in lowly hypnotizable (LH) highly (HH) subjects. A nocebo, obtained a two-step intervention (verbal expectation conditioning), were studied 12 LH HH subjects hypnosis. Visual analog scales (VASs) pain intensity recorded response short, painful electrical stimuli. VAS scores placebo-produced diffe...

UNLABELLED BACKGROUND Patients' expectations of treatment effects may contribute to positive (placebo) and negative (nocebo) outcomes. The effect of patient expectations may be pronounced in subjectively assessed conditions, such as male erectile dysfunction. The aim of this project is to examine the magnitude of expectancy in trials of phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors. We hypothesize that ran...