The DOI matches its Crossref record; 82 of the 82 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Relieving patients' pain with expectation interventions: a meta-analysis
Open accessAbstract
Patients' expectations are important predictors of the outcome of analgesic treatments, as demonstrated predominantly in research on placebo effects. Three commonly investigated interventions that have been found to induce expectations (verbal suggestion, conditioning, and mental imagery) entail promising, brief, and easy-to-implement adjunctive procedures for optimizing the effectiveness of analgesic treatments. However, evidence for their efficacy stems mostly from research on experimentally evoked pain in healthy samples, and these findings might not be directly transferable to clinical populations. The current meta-analysis investigated the effects of these expectation inductions on patients' pain relief. Five bibliographic databases were systematically searched for studies that assessed the effects of brief verbal suggestion, conditioning, or imagery interventions on pain in clinical populations, with patients experiencing experimental, acute procedural, or chronic pain, compared with no treatment or control treatment. Of the 15,955 studies retrieved, 30 met the inclusion criteria, of which 27 provided sufficient data for quantitative analyses. Overall, a medium-sized effect of the interventions on patients' pain relief was observed (Hedges g = 0.61, I = 73%), with varying effects of verbal suggestion (k = 18, g = 0.75), conditioning (always paired with verbal suggestion, k = 3, g = 0.65), and imagery (k = 6, g = 0.27). Subset analyses indicated medium to large effects on experimental and acute procedural pain and small effects on chronic pain. In conclusion, patients' pain can be relieved with expectation interventions; particularly, verbal suggestion for acute procedural pain was found to be effective.
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Implications of placebo and nocebo effects for clinical practice: Expert consensus
Evers, A. W. M., Colloca, L., Blease, C., Annoni, M., Atlas, L. Y., Benedetti, F., Bingel, U., Büchel, C., Carvalho, C., Colagiuri, B., et al. (2018) · Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics · doi:10.1159/000490354 · Cited by 562
Self-citationAn integrative review of the influence of expectancies on pain
Peerdeman, K. J., Laarhoven, A. I. M. V., Peters, M. L., & Evers, A. W. M. (2016) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2016.01270 · Cited by 122
Self-citationSensitivity to pain expectations: A Bayesian model of individual differences
Hoskin, R., Berzuini, C., Acosta-Kane, D., El-Deredy, W., Guo, H., & Talmi, D. (2019) · Cognition · doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2018.08.022 · Cited by 87
Placebo and nocebo effects across symptoms: from pain to fatigue, dyspnea, nausea, and itch
Wolters, F., Peerdeman, K. J., & Evers, A. W. M. (2019) · Frontiers in Psychiatry · doi:10.3389/fpsyt.2019.00470 · Cited by 57
Self-citationUnderpredicting pain: an experimental investigation into the benefits and risks
Peerdeman, K. J., Geers, A. L., Della Porta, D., Veldhuijzen, D. S., & Kirsch, I. (2021) · Pain · doi:10.1097/j.pain.0000000000002199 · Cited by 25
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Metadata
- Authors
- Peerdeman, K. J., van Laarhoven, A. I. M., Keij, S. M., Vase, L., Rovers, M. M., Peters, M. L., & Evers, A. W. M.
- Affiliations
- Leiden University (NL)
- ORCID
- Venue
- Pain
- Published
- 2016-06
- Volume
- 157
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 1179-1191
- ISSN
- 0304-3959 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2301817203
- Cited by
- 239
- References
- 82
- Citations by year
- 2026: 18 · 2025: 27 · 2024: 20 · 2023: 22 · 2022: 28 · 2021: 22 · 2020: 19 · 2019: 28 · 2018: 26 · 2017: 20 · 2016: 8
- FWCI
- 2.87
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- Licence
- other-oa
- Locations
- Pain (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Research Publications (Maastricht University) (publishedVersion, other-oa)
- Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion)
- Leiden Repository (Leiden University) (submittedVersion)
- Radboud Repository (Radboud University) (submittedVersion)
- Research Publications (Maastricht University) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Pain Management and Placebo Effect
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Pediatrics, Perinatology and Child Health › Pediatric Pain Management Techniques
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Physiology (medical) › Pain Mechanisms and Treatments
- Keywords
- analgesia, verbal suggestion, conditioning, mental imagery, placebo effect, analgesic treatment, chronic pain, experimental pain
- MeSH terms
- Conditioning, Psychological, Humans, Pain, Suggestion, Placebo Effect, Imagery, Psychotherapy, Pain Management
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