[Errors of the placebo test]

The difficulties inherent in clinical experimentation in phlebology, stem from the fact that they concern highly subjective functional problems, and are thus difficult to measure. The answer to these difficulties seems to be found in the use of the double blind method. This method, however, contains numerous causes of errors in phlebology, since in order to be mathematically applied to computer use, it is too sketchy and does not take into account many additional factors, incidental parameters and unfavorable coincidences related either to chronobiology (weather, seasonal changes), to hormonal problems (periods of the cycle, pregnancies, contraception, menopause), to the environment (professional posture, ground heat, periods of vacation or work), or associated diseases (neuro-vegetative and rheumatic disorders, excessive weight, metabolic disorders), etc. It seems that in such cases, wide experimentation, with a very critical clinician, who attributes the improvement obtained to the drugs prescribed only when left with no other possibility and after having eliminated all the coincidental factors, gives results closer to reality than double blind experiments, behind whose pseudo-scientific appearance lies a sketchiness that is the cause of numerous errors.