[sci-am] immunosuppression can be trained!

[adam altman]

pretty cool experiment that shows the link between brain training to tastes and immunosuppression.  using strawberry-lavendar milk as the taste:

First

group 1: taste + drug.  

group 2: taste + placebo.

Then

both:  taste + placebo.

group 1's response was much stronger in both instances.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-taste-of-immune-suppression&utm_source=sendgrid.com&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=website

[Tristan Orford]

The real mind-bender for me is how our conscious mind remains largely cut out of the picture in a response pathway like this.  It seems there should be a way to train yourself to do this without the need for the placebo rigmarole.

[Adam A. Altman]

I do think that understanding the placebo effect will be one of those watershed discoveries in human health...whenever it comes.   my bet is at least 25 years out.   but once the process is understood, we should be able to simply direct our bodies to heal.

[Lindsay Hong]

​H​

ere's an awesome TED Talk about the placebo effect and self

​-​

healing

​: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWQfe__fNbs#t=355​. I think it's worth watching the whole video even though it's a bit long.

• While the medical community often views the placebo effect as a problem since it prevents new treatments and devices from entering the market, we actually need to harness its power.
• The placebo effect isn't just about people **feeling better**. There are often measurable physiologic responses (e.g., ulcers that heal, cancers that go away without treatment).
• The parasympathetic nervous system, which can only turn on when your nervous system is relaxed (i.e., it can't function when in flight or flight mode), releases healing hormones. It is hypothesized that taking a placebo psychologically triggers this system.
• ​On a related topic, we discussed an
   interesting finding in my recent lecture on herpes
  ​. L
  ying suppresses the immune system
  ​, so there are lower transmission rates between people who are infected and their partners when they openly discuss their infection compared to those who lie.

​Lindsay​

[Adam Altman]

do you know if there are any placebo healers practicing and what their results have been/

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "notablenotes" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to notablenotes...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

[Lindsay Hong]

Not that I know of. Ethically, you can’t tell people they’re being treated when they really aren’t.

Lindsay