Praying doesn't do jack for sick patients.

[buttmunch]

AP) Does praying for a sick person's recovery do any good?

In the largest scientific test of its kind, heart surgery patients showed no benefit when strangers prayed for their recovery.

And patients who knew they were being prayed for had a slightly higher rate of complications. Doctors could only guess why.

Several scientists questioned the concept of the study.

Science “is not designed to study the supernatural,” said Dr. Harold G. Koenig, director of the Center for Spirituality, Theology and Health at the Duke University Medical Center.

The researchers emphasized that their $2.4 million study could not address whether God exists or answer prayers made on another's behalf. The study could look only for an effect from the specific prayers offered as part of the research, they said.

The study “did not move us forward or backward” in understanding the effects of prayer, said Dr. Charles Bethea, a co-author and cardiologist at the Integris Baptist Medical Center in Oklahoma City. “Intercessory prayer under our restricted format had a neutral effect.”

Dr. Herbert Benson of Harvard Medical School, co-principal investigator of the study, agreed. “We cannot come to a conclusion, except to say that by this study design, with its limitations, this is what we found,” he said.

Researchers also said they didn't know why patients who knew they were being prayed for had a higher rate of complications than patients who only knew that such prayers were a possibility.

Maybe they became anxious by the knowledge that they'd been selected for prayers, Bethea said: “Did the patients think, 'I am so sick that they had to call in the prayer team?’”

The researchers said family and friends shouldn't be discouraged from telling a patient about their plans to pray for a good recovery. The study only focused on prayers by strangers, they said.

It's the largest and best-designed study ever to test the medical effects of intercessory prayers — praying on behalf of someone else. But critics said the question of God's reaction to prayer simply can't be explored by scientific study.

The study followed about 1,800 patients at six medical centers. It was financed by the Templeton Foundation, which supports research into science and religion, and one of the participating hospitals. It will appear in Tuesday's issue of the American Heart Journal.

The research team tested the effect of having three Christian groups pray for particular patients, starting the night before surgery and continuing for two weeks. The volunteers prayed for “a successful surgery with a quick, healthy recovery and no complications” for specific patients — their identities known only by first name and first initial of the last name.

The patients, meanwhile, were split into three groups of about 600 apiece: those who knew they were being prayed for, those who were prayed for but only knew it was a possibility, and those who weren't prayed for but were told it was a possibility.

The researchers didn't ask patients or their families and friends to alter any plans they had for prayer, saying such a step would have been unethical and impractical.

The study looked for any complications within 30 days of the surgery. Results showed no effect of prayer on complication-free recovery. But 59 percent of the patients who knew they were being prayed for developed a complication, versus 52 percent of those who were told it was just a possibility.

Koenig, of Duke University Medical Center, who didn't take part in the study, said the results didn't surprise him.

“There are no scientific grounds to expect a result and there are no real theological grounds to expect a result either,” he said. “There is no god in either the Christian, Jewish or Moslem scriptures that can be constrained to the point that they can be predicted.”

Within the Christian tradition, God would be expected to be concerned with a person's eternal salvation, he said, and “why would God change his plans for a particular person just because they're in a research study?”

Dr. David Stevens, executive director of the Christian Medical and Dental Associations, said he believes intercessory prayer can influence medical outcomes, but that science is not equipped to explore it.

“Do we control God through prayer? Theologians would say absolutely not. God decides sometimes to intervene, and sometimes not,” he said.

As for the new study, he said, “I don't think ... it's going to stop people praying for the sick.”

[Barbara]

I smell some kind of... BS!

[buttmunch]

This is from AP, so it's legit. What sort of BS are we thinking of?

[Barbara]

I'm puzzled by the study in itself, let alone the fact they had funds to do it.
IMO the "evidence" is thin.

And if I were God I would not make my plans easy to study either.

[Grimmlok]

It's all psychosomatic

[twitchy]

Prayer helps the people who are praying feel that they are doing something.

[miss_perfect]

Originally Posted by Killjoy

I say whatever. When I was ill I was put on several church's pray lists and I think that coupled with just the thought that so many cared helped me not to give up. Everyone knows when you are seriously ill it's so easy to fall into despair and depression but having people around you and hearing their concern helps lift you out of that funk.
So no matter what the studies say I'm gonna keep on praying for people.

Exactly. Prayer might help patients and their families deal with the emotional issues that arise from being ill. Glad that you are better!

[bella]

I agree. It can almost certainly do no harm, and if it helps the patient feel cared for and thought about, and helps the family to feel useful, whats the problem?

[Grimmlok]

Well some people think if you pray hard enough, Jebus will just wish the cancer away.

[Lobelia]

I know that everybody's got anecdotal evidence one way or the other, but back when my brother was a criminal, he was in a car accident & was in a coma. He was put on several church prayer lists, and since I don't go to church, I asked some friends to pray. When he awoke, he said that he felt like a legion of people had lifted him up... it was difficult for him to explain, but he said that he knew people were praying for him, and it drew him back, so to speak. Despite everything the doctors said, he made a full recovery.

That study means nothing to me. Studies are done every day that contradict the ones done before. I've been involved in doing studies where the folks in charge play fast & loose with the variables, so the results were bogus, but published anyway. IMO, it's just like having religious tunnel vision if you blindly believe every flippin' scientific study that comes out. Scientists are people, and people screw up.

[UndercoverGator]

I call bullshit on this one. During a prayer session I was healed of 41 years of chronic asthma. I was on inhalers for years and now for the last 5 I've been without one symptom. I may be rather flexable about others believing whatever but this one is a non-negociable to me.

[Grimmlok]

Everything is negociable, for all you know it was a psychosomatic response. Your brain is a powerful mechanism, and can do fantastic things with your body. Look at the Tai Chi masters who can can cause objects to heat up for healing purposes by waving their hands over it, the woman who was able to lift a car off her child when it was trapped under it.. I've personally had reiki massage after injuring my arm, complete with an almost quasi-meditation trance, visualization and manipulation of energies within the body and after that, the arm was fine and I pulled out of the meditation and felt like I had just slept a good 8 hours. I could barely move the arm before, but after 30 mins of said treatment (done by a hippie girl, at 2 am, under the stars in a forest clearing no less) it was perfectly fine.

To be fair, that night was rather odd for me.. I was in a very connected space with nature, I could almost feel the energy being given off by plants and trees. Haven't had it again, but it was a fascinating experience.

I don't attribute it to a god or deity, but I will attribute it to the power of the human mind and its ability to focus energy in a myriad of ways. I've always suspected that the 'power of prayer' was nothing more than concentration of energy, focused by a group of people, and your own body chiming in to direct it.

[Grimmlok]

Erroneous as it may be, I don't see the harm in it. I just wish people would concentrate more on unlocking our own potential than constantly pawning it off on some mysterious deity.

[Lobelia]

I don't see focusing on the power of the human mind as being any less fantastic & ridiculous as focusing on the power of God. It's all intangible & supernatural. One's no less weird than the other. Which must be why I'm intrigued by both.

[Grimmlok]

Well, there's more direct evidence of the power of the human mind through various adepts and masters than of God