Are some operations only effective because of the placebo effect?
The effectiveness of alternative or homeopathic medicine is simply down to the placebo effect, but it may be that a number of routine operations only achieve their efficacy through the same process. In a fascinating article in today’s “Observer” newspaper, one surgeon comes clean on what is going on:
“Nobody is suggesting that a liver transplant, cancer surgery or a cataract operation is ineffective or down to placebo,” says Andy Carr, a professor of surgery at the University of Oxford. “But for more routine surgeries, where outcomes are subjective things, such as pain or stiffness, there’s good evidence that many are little more than placebo. Given that these operations cause risk to patients and cost to hospitals, that is good evidence that we should stop doing them.”