[edit ] Modern clinical application

Experimenters typically use placebos in the context of a clinical trial. in which a "test group" of patients receives the therapy being tested, and a "control group " receives the placebo. It can then be determined if results from the "test" group exceed those due to the placebo effect. If they do, the therapy or pill given to the "test group" is assumed to have had an effect. The first well documented use of a placebo in a clinical trial was reported in "Streptomycin treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis". BMJ 1948;2:769--782, a research paper by the Medical Research Council. Thus, if a therapy or medicine has no effect beyond placebo, then it is said to have no effect or efficacy beyond non-specific effects.