Since I mentioned information related to this several times, thought I'd repost a discussion I wrote for my alternative medicine course in the hopes you all would find it both informative and encouraging. Since it was for a course, it's written in a more academic style. Please don't let that put you off as the information is really eye-opening. At least it was for me. Without further ado...
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Of the five misconceptions made by traditional western doctors about the "placebo effect" that Weil (1998) lists, I am choosing to examine the first one—that being,: "Placebo responses are not as strong as objective effects of treatments and can be differentiated from objective effects on that basis (p. 208).
Last night while perusing a book on emotional intelligence written by the scholar considered to be the foremost proponent of the concept, Daniel Goleman (Goleman, 1995), I discovered a chapter on mind and medicine, within which a section, "The Body's Mind: How Emotions Matter for Health" discussed an actual mechanism by which the mind and body communicate.
According to Goleman (1995), in 1974, a psychologist, Robert Ader, discovered that the immune system (which consists primarily of the lymphatic system and related organs such as the spleen, bone marrow, thymus (The immune system, 2003). Ader found that when rats were given a medication that suppressed the immune system along with a placebo, even when the medication was withheld, the rats' immune system continued to function in a depressed manner. This finding totally contradicts the notion that the placebo effect is "weaker" than that of a "material" medical treatment. Ader's conclusion was that the immune system "learned" (Goleman, op cit). From a slightly different perspective, "The immune system is the 'body's brain,' as neuroscientist Francoise Varela, at Paris's Ecole Polytechnique, puts it, defining the body's own sense of self of what belongs within it and what does not" (Varela, 1990, cited in Goleman, op cit, p. 166).
Since Ader's discovery, a new field called "psychoneuroimmunology" has emerged and established itself (Goleman, 1995). A further discovery within this field is specific connections between the immune and the nervous systems. Studies have discovered synapselike contacts between the nerve terminals of the autonomic nervous system and immune cells (Goleman, op cit, p. 167). He states, "In short, the nervous system not only connects to the immune system, but is essential for proper immune function."
Because of the rate of new knowledge generation, it is extremely difficult for any medical practitioner to stay abreast of new knowledge that could potentially improve his/her practice. However, it is hoped that some of these enlightening discoveries will make their way into medical training as well as professional development required for certification maintenance. This assumes that old biases will begin to lift as new discoveries related to the mind/body relationship help correct the misconceptions--especially related to the power of the placebo effect--that Weil has observed.
REFERENCES
Goleman, G. (1995). Emotional intelligence. NY: Bantam Books.
The immune system. (2003). Retrieved May 27, 2005, from NIAID Net News Web Site:
http://www.niaid.nih.gov/final/immun/immun.htm
Weil, A. (1998). Health and Healing. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.
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