Our preliminary findings suggest patients with high baseline cytokine levels may be less likely to report placebo response for multiple symptoms. Upon further confirmation, these findings may have implications for future clinical trial design. In this exploratory analysis, we observed that patients with cancer were less likely to report placebo response for multiple symptoms if they had higher levels of baseline cytokines. These preliminary findings have important potential implications for placebo-controlled clinical trials, including patient selection, design of interventional controls, and trial interpretation. Additionally, they invite further research on possible mechanistic links between inflammation and placebo effect.
Hui et al. (2026) studied this question.