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Originally Posted by David Bailey  There are anecdotal accounts of remarkable placebo effects. Since these 'anecdotes' are from doctors, perhaps they are not to be taken too lightly. |
The point about anecdotes is not that the people reporting them are unreliable but that the causal connection between the events may be imaginary. The only way to tell is to do some sort of a controlled trial.
There are a huge number of anecdotes about the supposed connection between emotional attitude and cancer survival rates. It has almost become dogma that people with a positive outlook do better. However, well conducted studies find no independent effect due to emotional well-being.
Emotional well-being does not predict survival in head and neck cancer patients