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Placebo-Controlled Trial

Meaning

A Placebo-Controlled Trial is a rigorously designed clinical study in which human participants are randomly assigned to receive either the active investigational treatment or an inert substance, known as a placebo, that is manufactured to be physically indistinguishable from the active treatment. This specific design serves as the universally recognized gold standard for definitively establishing the true efficacy of a new medical intervention by meticulously isolating the specific pharmacological effects from the psychological effects of expectation and the natural, fluctuating course of the disease. This methodology is absolutely fundamental to the principles of evidence-based medicine and regulatory drug approval.