Conditioned Open-label Placebos to Facilitate Opioid Reduction in Patients With Chronic Non-cancer Pain — ROM  

Chronic Non-cancer Pain Clinical Trial

Official title: Conditioned Open-label Placebos to Facilitate the Reduction of Opioid Medication (ROM) in Patients With Chronic Non-cancer Pain: a Randomized Controlled Trial

Status Not yet recruiting

Clinical Trial Summary

This study aims to evaluate whether the reduction of the daily morphine equivalent dose (MED) in patients with chronic non-cancer pain (CNCP) can be decreased with an open-label placebo (OLP) intervention in comparison to an electronic monitoring (EM) control group. The participants will receive the intervention (OPL or EM) over the duration of six weeks. Diverse psychological and health measures will be assessed with questionnaires over the course of the intervention. Furthermore, evaluation outcomes, qualitative outcomes and safety outcomes will be assessed. It is hypothesized that the OLP-intervention group in comparison to the EM-control group will have a significantly lower consumption of MED over the course of the study. Furthermore, this study aims to evaluate whether the OLP intervention can reduce opioid withdrawal symptoms in comparison to the control group.

Clinical Trial Description

CNCP is a major global health problem and is often treated with opiod medication, although risks outweigh the benefits. Therefore, recent studies suggest that an open-label placebo (OLP) treatment, the placebo treatment with full disclosure of being a placebo, has proven to be an effective, clinically relevant, and evidence-based treatment in CNCP syndromes. Furthermore, a new line of research indicated that OLPs have been shown to be feasible for the reduction of active medication in opioid use disorder. In line with the conditioning paradigm, the drug as the unconditioned stimulus is paired with the neutral stimulus of an OLP in a learning phase. Then, the OLP alone becomes a conditioned stimulus. ;

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Chronic Non-cancer Pain

• NCT number: NCT06350786
• Study type: Interventional
• Source: University of Zurich
• Contact: Cosima Locher, PhD
• Phone: +41 44 255 12 03
• Email: Cosima.Locher@usz.ch
• Status: Not yet recruiting
• Phase: N/A
• Start date: May 2024
• Completion date: July 2025