Thu 19 Jun 2008
It’s not often that the pharmaceutical and mommy domains of my life intersect, but here you go: Placebo pills for kids.
I think if it’s unethical to give placebos to adults, then it’s unethical to give them to kids, too — not to mention that it’s unhealthy to model taking unnecessary drugs.
Husband says it’s harmless, like a kiss on a boo-boo.
What do you think?
June 19th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
My parents gave my younger sister some sort of sugar pill around age 10, because she still wet the bed every night. It worked. She still doesn’t know it wasn’t a real drug. While I’m not sure I agree in most cases about giving a placebo, in that case I was all for it, since I was the one who had to wake her up, give her a bath, and change the sheets on her bed every morning!
June 19th, 2008 at 3:58 pm
The woman who has had to deal with a wet bed three nights in a row is suddenly experiencing a change of opinion about this placebo stuff.
I still think it’s unethical, but now I don’t care so much.
June 20th, 2008 at 2:59 pm
Thanks for the information on the new placebos pill for kids. Placebos are proven to work, but it it morally right to give your kid a fake pill when they might actually have real symptoms? It’s a hard question to answer…
We recently wrote an article on placebos at Brain Blogger. A recent survey of more than 200 doctors that practice in academic medical centers, showed that 45% of them had given placebos to patients while providing clinical care. Is this right though? Is giving a pateint a placebo a form of betrayal?
We would like to read your comments on our article. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Kelly
June 20th, 2008 at 5:37 pm
As the mother of two young boys who beg for medicine at every opportunity (”My hair is hurting! I need medicine!”) the last thing I want to do is encourage more medicine-begging.
AM