I attempted to address subtypes in post #15 above. Are those of you who are speaking of subtypes thinking in this way about subtypes? If not, can you be more specific about what you would consider subtypes to be.

Subtypes would include:
1) slow progression with tremor,
2) rapid progression with tremor,
3) #1 without tremor,
4) #2 without tremor,
5) with dynkinesia,
6) with dystonia,
7) with both 3 and 4.

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On the topic of placebo I found this:

plac-, placi-, -plais
(Latin: to please, to satisfy; peace, peacefulness; calm, calmness)

http://www.wordinfo.info/words/index...age=8&letter=P

placate
placebo (antonym: "nocebo")

1. "I shall please".
2. In medicine, a prescription given to please a patient who, in the physician's opinion, needs no medication.
3. something of no inherent benefit that is done, or said, simply to placate or to reassure someone.
4. Something prescribed for a patient that contains no medicine, but is given for the positive psychological effect it may have because the patient believes that he or she is receiving treatment.
5. A "sugar pill" or any dummy medication or treatment; for example, in a controlled clinical trial, one group may be given a real medication while another group is given a placebo that looks just like it in order to learn if the differences observed are due to the medication or to the power of mental suggestion.
6. Etymology: from Latin placebo, "I shall please"; future indicative of placere, "to please".

The medical sense is first recorded in about 1785, "a medicine given more to please than to benefit the patient".


The placebo effect and the power of belief
"Michael Brooks, a writer of an article in New Scientist magazine, took part in a "placebo" experiment in which he was told that a computer screen would indicate whether electric shocks would be mild when a green light showed up or a red light would indicate when the shock would be "more severe".

"After about fifteen minutes, the experiment ended with what he thought were a series of "mild shocks" until he was told that the "last series of shocks" were all severe. He "felt the electric fence jolts as a series of gentle taps" on his arm until he was told that the "last series of shocks were all severe".

"He realized that he had experienced "the placebo effect" because his brain had been conditioned to anticipate low pain when he saw the green light on the computer screen for the series.

"The "placebo effect" for quite awhile has been considered to be nothing more than the "power of positive thinking" and so people believed that they were receiving good medical care even though it might have been nothing more than a sugar pill or an encouraging manner of the physician. In many cases, people started to feel better without any additional medical treatment.

"Some current research about the placebo effect indicates that it is more complicated than simply being a "positive thinking" result; however, depending on how it is done, the placebo effect can make some people feel better even when they are not really any better."


Editorial: "Patient, heal thyself"
"The placebo effect has been known since the beginnings of medicine.

"About the only medicine doctors from long ago could offer their patients was the reassurance that a medical treatment would work and it often was successful.

"It has become apparent that a patient's state of mind, awareness of his/her condition and expectations of the care she/he is about to receive can influence many outcomes of medicine from consultations with a doctor to clinical trials of a new drug.

"Apparently the usefulness of a drug, for example, depends on much more than the chemicals in a pill, and a deeper understanding of the placebo effect can turn it into a valuable tool for reducing suffering."