Publication Date:
2001-08-11
Description:
The power of placebos has long been recognized for improving numerous medical conditions such as Parkinson's disease (PD). Little is known, however, about the mechanism underlying the placebo effect. Using the ability of endogenous dopamine to compete for [11C]raclopride binding as measured by positron emission tomography, we provide in vivo evidence for substantial release of endogenous dopamine in the striatum of PD patients in response to placebo. Our findings indicate that the placebo effect in PD is powerful and is mediated through activation of the damaged nigrostriatal dopamine system.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉de la Fuente-Fernandez, R -- Ruth, T J -- Sossi, V -- Schulzer, M -- Calne, D B -- Stoessl, A J -- New York, N.Y. -- Science. 2001 Aug 10;293(5532):1164-6.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉Neurodegenerative Disorders Centre, TRIUMF, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada V6T 2B5.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11498597" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Keywords:
Aged
;
Antiparkinson Agents/administration & dosage/*therapeutic use
;
Apomorphine/administration & dosage/*therapeutic use
;
Corpus Striatum/*metabolism/radionuclide imaging
;
Dopamine/*metabolism
;
Female
;
Humans
;
Male
;
Middle Aged
;
Parkinson Disease/*drug therapy/metabolism
;
*Placebo Effect
;
Placebos/administration & dosage
;
Raclopride/metabolism
;
Synapses/metabolism
;
Tomography, Emission-Computed
Print ISSN:
0036-8075
Electronic ISSN:
1095-9203
Topics:
Biology
,
Chemistry and Pharmacology
,
Computer Science
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
,
Physics
