Effect prayers on patients difficult to measure
DURHAM - The results of a long-awaited scientific study aimed at measuring the effect of third-party prayer for hospitalized patients not only did not match the expectations of those conducting the study, but also may have raised more questions for researchers than it answered.
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The Study of the Therapeutic Effects of Intercessory Prayer (STEP), published online last week by the American Heart Journal, showed no positive effect from the use of third-party intercessory prayer on behalf of patients undergoing a specific type of heart surgery at six medical centers around the United States when compared with a control group who were not prayed for as part of the study.
Another unexpected result: Patients who knew they were being prayed for had somewhat more medical complications than another group who also had received prayer but were uncertain as to whether they had or not. Researchers had expected the reverse outcome.
STEP aimed to provide more accurate results than four previous trials that involved cardiac patients, the authors said. The results of those trials were mixed: Two found a beneficial effect of prayer; two found no benefit. The earlier studies were also criticized for having design flaws, the authors said.
About 95 percent of all the STEP participants -including a control group that was not prayed for as part of the study- said that they expected friends, relatives, or members of their religious institutions to be praying for them. About two-thirds strongly agreed with the statement: ”I believe in spiritual healing”.
The authors were careful to point out the limited conclusions that could be drawn from their study. „Private or family prayer is widely believed to influence recovery from illness, and the results of this study do not challenge this belief”, the authors wrote. „Our study focused only on intercessory prayer as provided in this trial and was never intended to and cannot address a large number of religious questions, such as whether God exists, whether God answers intercessory prayers, or whether prayers from one religious group work in the same way as prayers from other groups.”
The Office of Prayer Research, sponsored by the Association of Unity Churches, has collected some 400 scientific studies on the subject of prayer and healing. About 75 percent show prayer having a positive impact on health, says Bob Barth, director of the office. „It’s so easy to jump to conclusions that prayer doesn’t work”, he says. But rather than placing too much emphasis on any one clinical trial, he says, STEP should open up „so many more areas where research should be done”, such as a study comparing the effects of people using a standardized prayer versus people using their own prayers.
According to a nationwide US government survey of complementary and alternative therapies released in 2004, 43 percent of American adults pray for their own health and 24 percent report having had others pray for their health. (The Christian Science Monitor)
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