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Half of American Doctors Often Prescribe Placebos
damn_registrars writes "'Half of all American doctors responding to a nationwide survey say they regularly prescribe placebos to patients. The results trouble medical ethicists, who say more research is needed to determine whether doctors must deceive patients in order for placebos to work.'
The study just quoted goes on to say that the drugs most often used as placebo are headache pills, vitamins, and antibiotics. Studies on doctors in Europe and New Zealand have found similar results."
I have friends and relatives who get the Flu and run off to the doctor to get a prescription. I try to explain, that antibiotics won't help a viral infection but people just want to take a pill. It doesn't cost me any money for my time when I'm talking about it with them, but for a doctor time is money. He can lose money and potentially go out of business because every asshole who walks through the door wants or needs pills to feel better or he can just give them placebo and get on with his day.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
So sayeth the article. But I ask you, do the ethical challenges concern doctors fobbing patients off with placebos, or the existence of an environment where a doctor is afraid or unable to legitimately tell hypochondriacs that they are not sick and send them home?
May the Maths Be with you!
Antibiotics shouldn't be prescribed all willy-nilly. It just helps in the creation of super bugs.
For the love of non-antibiotic resistant tuberculosis, WHO are these doctors STILL giving out antibiotics when they don't need to? Is it not illegal for a doctor to prescribe medicine when it's not needed, and WHY AREN'T WE PUTTING THEM IN JAIL when they give out antibiotics for the cold etc? I know it must get annoying to deal with idiots asking for drugs they don't need, but that's your damn job, it's even more annoying if you get infected with superbugs you're making. Tell your patients that a spoonfull of sugar will cure them in aproximately 1 week if you absolutely need to give them something.
Seriously, it should be a felony to be giving out antibiotics when they're not needed.
How can doctors get away with this?
They're "getting away" with it because frequently it's in the best interest of their patients.
With the cost of medicine, how dare they make people go out and buy something they don't need.
They don't *make* people go out and do anything.
Most likely, people go to the doctor and expect to walk away with a prescription. The doctor has two choices:
1. give them a placebo, and tell them what to do to really fix the problem (bed rest or more exercise, as applicable to the situation.)
2. explain to them that a pill won't fix anything, and what they need to do to fix the problem.
If the doctor tells them 1, the patient walks away happy.
If the doctor tells them 2, the patient resents the doctor and ignores the advice about what to do to really get healthy.
How about honesty and good bedside manner?
Honesty and good bedside manner don't go very far when people are told by big pharmaceutical companies that there is a pill to cure everything.
If placebos didn't work, then doctors wouldn't prescribe them. I guess the better question is how can we give people placebos without them realizing it's a placebo? I don't personally agree with giving out antibiotics as placebos. The trick is, with the internet, deceiving your patients is getting pretty hard.
It occurs to me that killing half of all doctors might have unpleasant consequences for society.
Antibiotics shouldn't be prescribed all willy-nilly. It just helps in the creation of super bugs.
Depending on age, 14% to 30% of patients either skip doses or do not finish their regimen of antibiotics.
That is much more worrisome than the over prescription of antibiotics, because when someone sick doesn't finish their meds, you know that whatever is leftover gets stronger.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!