placebo
Americannoun
plural
placebos, placeboes-
Medicine/Medical, Pharmacology.
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a substance having no pharmacological effect but given merely to satisfy a patient who supposes it to be a medicine.
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a substance having no pharmacological effect but administered as a control in testing experimentally or clinically the efficacy of a biologically active preparation.
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Roman Catholic Church. the vespers of the office for the dead: so called from the initial word of the first antiphon, taken from Psalm 114:9 of the Vulgate.
noun
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med an inactive substance or other sham form of therapy administered to a patient usually to compare its effects with those of a real drug or treatment, but sometimes for the psychological benefit to the patient through his believing he is receiving treatment See also control group placebo effect
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something said or done to please or humour another
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RC Church a traditional name for the vespers of the office for the dead
Discover More
Those receiving a placebo often get better, a phenomenon known as the placebo effect.
Etymology
Origin of placebo
1175–1225 placebo for def. 2; 1775–85 placebo for def. 1; Middle English < Latin placēbō “I shall be pleasing, acceptable”
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Although many systematic reviews have examined exercise, no single analysis had pulled together all the available evidence comparing it directly with placebo, usual care, no treatment, medications, other therapies, or surgery.
From Science Daily
Ideally, participants are "blind" and unaware of which group they are in, which reduces placebo effects.
From Science Daily
But this would have been impractical given the rarity of the disease, and unethical because some children would receive a placebo for a fatal disease.
UBT251 led to a mean weight loss of 19.7% after 24 weeks of treatment and also improved patients’ waist circumference, blood glucose, blood pressure, and lipids relative to placebo, the companies said.
From Barron's
Patients also showed improvements relative to placebo on key secondary goals of the trial including waist circumference, blood glucose and blood pressure, they added.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
