Alternative medicine. Is it all in your mind?
Therapeutic interventions may trigger nonspecific mechanisms whose effects are not attributable to the specific properties of a given treatment. Recent investigations on the placebo effect as well as other mind-body interactions are helping us to understand some of the underlying mechanisms, as well as beginning to provide us with potentially effective adjuvant treatment strategies for a variety of human diseases.
Tausk
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Department of Dermatology, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, Md., USA. ftausk@welchlink.welch.jhu.edu
D000529:Complementary Therapies; D006801:Humans; D015990:Placebo Effect; D012871:Skin Diseases / Q000523:psychology* / Q000628:therapy*