Modulating Placebo Effects in Clinical Trials: Study Team Briefing to Optimize Drug-Placebo Differences.

ABSTRACT: Clinical trials often face challenges with placebo effects that can mask actual drug effects. We evaluated whether briefing the study team members on placebo mechanisms influenced analgesia. In this study, we compared the analgesic effects of oxycodone and placebo in three groups of 32 subjects. The groups were treated by an untrained study team (Arm A), a team trained to maximize (Arm B) and a team trained to minimize placebo effects (Arm C). The primary outcome was the reduction of pain during the cold pressor test, assessed by the area under the pain curve of the visual analog scale before and after blinded administration of oxycodone or placebo. Oxycodone and placebo demonstrated the expected differences in pain reduction across all study arms. Briefing the study team did not significa

SUBMITTER: Coenen M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12614085 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature