Are the clinical effects of homoeopathy placebo effects? Comparative study of placebo-controlled trials of homoeopathy and allopathy
clinical paper · 2005
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SUMMARY
Comparative meta-analysis in The Lancet of placebo-controlled trials of homeopathy set against matched trials of conventional medicine, used here as the modern verdict on homeopathy's clinical effect. Its authors concluded that their finding was compatible with the clinical effects of homeopathy being placebo effects. Identifiers copied from PubMed (PMID 16125589) and Crossref (DOI 10.1016/S0140-6736(05)67177-2): Lancet, volume 366, issue 9487, pages 726-732, 27 August 2005; first author Aijing Shang. The first six authors are copied from the PubMed record (Shang A, Huwiler-Müntener K, Nartey L, Jüni P, Dörig S, Sterne JA); 'et al.' stands for the remaining authors not individually verified here.
NOTES
Shang and colleagues’ 2005 study in The Lancet is the principal modern evidence cited in this case for the conclusion that homeopathy’s measured clinical effects are not distinguishable from placebo. The study compared placebo-controlled trials of homeopathy with matched placebo-controlled trials of conventional medicine and reported that the homeopathy results were compatible with the effects being due to placebo. The case uses this as the contemporary endpoint of the same disconfirmation the 1835 Nuremberg salt test first reached on a single high dilution. Bibliographic metadata are copied from the deterministic PubMed and Crossref records (PMID 16125589; DOI 10.1016/S0140-6736(05)67177-2; Lancet 366(9487):726-732, 2005).