Animals also respond to placebo

The placebo effect is a positive effect on the patient's condition of a dummy drug. Studying this effect will allow identifying new therapeutic targets in the brain, as well as new treatment strategies for various diseases.

Researchers at the University of Florida, working under the guidance of Associate Professor John Neubert, have found that the placebo effect is not unique to humans. It turned out that rats expecting pain relief actually experience it when using an inert substance.

As part of their experiments, the authors taught rats experiencing pain as a result of thermal exposure in the facial area to expect an injection of morphine or saline solution by administering one or another drug for two sessions. After that, they conducted a third session, during which both groups of animals were injected with a saline solution. Approximately 30-40% of the animals in the group that had previously received morphine injections behaved as if they had actually received an analgesic and experienced pain relief.

This means that rats are an adequate model for studying the placebo effect. The presence of such a model will allow specialists to study processes similar to those occurring in the human body.

The preliminary results of the experiments currently being conducted by scientists on mice are completely comparable with the results of work on rats.

Article by Todd A. Nolan et al. Placebo-induced analgesia in an operant pain model in rats is published in the journal PAIN.

Evgeniya Ryabtseva
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru based on the materials of the University of Florida:
The placebo effect goes beyond humans, UF researchers find.

29.11.2012