The Placebo Effect

"The physician's belief in the treatment and the patient's faith in the physician exert a mutually reinforcing effect; the result is a powerful remedy that is almost guaranteed to produce an improvement and sometimes a cure" Skrabanek and McCormick, Follies and Fallacies in Medicine, p. 13.

Sometimes, like today, my job is simply to convene - the parties will do the rest.

The trick is to recognise what the prime role is on any given day - then to stay out of the way.

Gary Fitzpatrick taught me that.