Homeopathy and period pains

[Undesired Walrus]

My friend has bad period pains, but this month she took some Homeopathy pills, and her period pains have become the least painful they have been for many years.

Can someone explain what might have happened? I don't want her turning woo.

[Puppycow]

Placebo effect.

[Lothian]

Originally Posted by Undesired Walrus

My friend has bad period pains, but this month she took some Homeopathy pills, and her period pains have become the least painful they have been for many years.

Can someone explain what might have happened? I don't want her turning woo.

May also be that the pain is getting easier as she gets older. The misses is not nearly as irrational, unreasonable and psychotic affected as she used to be and no longer needs Nurofen Plus which she used to eat like sweeties.

[Undesired Walrus]

Originally Posted by Puppycow

Placebo effect.

Even if you take them weeks beforehand?

[Lothian]

Originally Posted by Undesired Walrus

Even if you take them weeks beforehand?

A placebo does not contain any active ingredients to affect the ailment. Rather it tricks the mind into thinking it will have an effect and the body reacts accordingly.
As such I think its effects will last as long as the patient believes they will.

[Mojo]

Originally Posted by Lothian

A placebo does not contain any active ingredients to affect the ailment. Rather it tricks the mind into thinking it will have an effect and the body reacts accordingly.

Or more likely tricks the mind into thinking that things are better when they aren't.

[Lothian]

Originally Posted by Mojo

Or more likely tricks the mind into thinking that things are better when they aren't.

or that.

[fls]

I wrote about this issue here:

"It's a matter of attention and anchoring.

Consider what happens when trying to recall these things. It's very difficult to get an accurate account of the course of symptoms/disease when taking a history. The heart attack that happened "two years ago" really happened ten years ago. The symptoms that have been "present for three months" were already complained about a year ago. This isn't done deliberately. We have difficulty estimating these things unless we can anchor them to something where the timing is known. If the heart attack happened at your daughter's wedding, there is no difficulty in recalling the date. But most of the time we don't really have the opportunity or inclination to track these things.

Add to that our tendency to notice only those things that are unusual in the first place. Regression almost guarantees that next time you ask, things will be better. It's just that most of the time we don't ask.

We have thousands of opportunities for success, but we squander most of them by not paying attention and by not providing a way to anchor the timing to a known event. Taking a homeopathic preparation solves both these problems. Now attention will be paid to that we would have ignored previously (the waxing and waning of eczema), and we have a specific event (the taking of a therapy) by which to time the course of events."

Your friend remembers the course of her periods as that of fairly unremitting pain, because why would those times when the pain wasn't so bad come to her notice? Until she is given a reason to notice the waning of her pain (in this case, the taking of a remedy), it isn't likely to come to her attention.

Now we add to that the issue of regression to the mean. As our symptoms wax and wane, it is when they are worse that we become desperate to try something. When we take something when our pain is unusually bad, we shouldn't show surprise when that is followed by a time when the pain is more typical or absent, yet we do.

Also, our perception of pain is quite subjective. It is a robust and consistent finding that regardless of what you take, you will report your pain as less afterward.

Finally, these 'natural' remedies are not subject to the same quality control as regular drugs and they have sometimes been found to be adulterated with regular pharmaceuticals - some of them controlled drugs or toxins. Or the label may say "homeopathic", but it contains botanical products with known effects which have not been diluted.

Linda

[Rolfe]

Having been a sufferer over the years, I would require anything to show a consistent effect month after month before I would be in any way convinced it was having an effect. I couldn't tell you the number of things I thought were helping, but later realised weren't making a blind bit of difference.

It does get better with age though. And then it goes away entirely, whoopee.

Rolfe.

[Undesired Walrus]

You're a woman??

[whatthebutlersaw]

Victim myself, and at least for me the pain fluctuated sometimes. I did not have the good fortune to get better with age, but I do know that this happens to a lot of sufferers. I know for a fact that I have had easier months, because I keep a diary to keep track, but making a quick recap I would probably say that I was in moderate to severe pain every month because I don't remember the "good" months.

Did your friend make any lifestyle changes at the same time? (For some women - like me- exercise and/or dietary changes can make a difference, depending on what is causing the discomfort.) Are you _sure_ your friend has a homeopathic remedy and not something that actually contains an active compound?

There are plenty of confounding/unknown factors, but apart from anything the placebo effect is particularly strong when it comes to pain and the ability to stand pain. I certainly get relief from a headache just knowing that I am doing something about it, even when there is no way the pill I just took could have gone out in my system yet.

Less bleeding would be more likely to make me sit up and take heed. (Btw, what does UK chemists have against tranexamic acid - it is considered safe for otc in Sweden, which is regulated to within an inch of its life, why not here? I do not believe the manufacturer does not want the money. Otc tranexamic acid is a top seller at chemists in Sweden and the market in UK must be much bigger.)

[Lisa Simpson]

Originally Posted by Undesired Walrus

You're a woman??

It always amuses me when people think Rolfe's a dude.

Anyway, period pain can vary from month to month and other things can influence it. I vote for placebo effect.

[Puppycow]

Originally Posted by Undesired Walrus

Even if you take them weeks beforehand?

As Lothian mentioned, the placebo effect is a psychological effect so if you believe that the effects will last for weeks, it could last for weeks.

BTW, once it was thought that royalty could cure disease by their divine touch.
I first read about this in Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. An example of the placebo effect before there was even a concept of a placebo. (Although this is a work of fiction, belief in the King's Evil was a historical fact)

[Rolfe]

Sunshine, anybody who tries to tell me that a placebo can have any effect on dysmenorrhoea pain is asking for a knuckle sandwich.

Coincidental improvement, yes. Believing it's not so bad when it really is, not so much.

Rolfe.

[fls]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

Sunshine, anybody who tries to tell me that a placebo can have any effect on dysmenorrhoea pain is asking for a knuckle sandwich.

Coincidental improvement, yes. Believing it's not so bad when it really is, not so much.

Rolfe.

Yeah, the reported pain improvement from placebo is less than the minimum that would be considered clinically relevant. Most people wouldn't be satisfied with the move from "unbearable" to "agonizing".

Linda