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March 30, 2006

New Study: Prayer Doesn't Help

A new study of more than 1,800 patients undergoing heart bypass surgery has found that prayers for the patients’ recovery had no impact, with some of the prayed-for people actually doing worse than those who were not.

"Intercessory prayer itself had no effect on whether complications occurred (and) patients who were certain that intercessors would pray for them had a higher rate of complications than patients who were uncertain but did receive intercessory prayer," the study said.

There is "no clear explanation" for the latter finding, it added.

There is one catch that puts this conclusion in doubt: most of the patients had friends or relatives who were also praying for them, and those doing the special praying did not know the people they were praying for.

"One caveat is that with so many individuals receiving prayer from friends and family, as well as personal prayer, it may be impossible to disentangle the effects of study prayer from background prayer."

The report’s conclusion makes me angry. Why do a study like this if it hasn’t been designed to answer the primary question?

"Private or family prayer is widely believed to influence recovery from illness, and the results of this study do not challenge this belief."

Oh, well. For years I have heard about the other studies that have accounted for these factors and have demonstrated the connection between being prayed for and healing, even if the subject did not know they were being prayed for. Who can argue with a scientific study? I have always seen these other studies as proof of the power of the spiritual connection between people.

A quick look at Wikipedia swept that rug out from under me:

A number of studies have suggested that patients who are being prayed for recover more quickly or more frequently. One such study (Byrd, 1988), with a double-blind design, suggested that intercessory prayer to the Judeo-Christian God may have had a statistically significant positive effect on a coronary care unit population. Sicher et al suggested statistically significant benefits to a group being prayed for ten years later (Sicher et al 1998). Another such study was reported by Harris et al 1999. Many similar studies have produced negative results as well, and it has been suggested that given the number of studies some will be favorable by pure chance.

But:

Critics claim that Byrd's 1988 study was not fully double-blinded, and that in the Harris et al 1999 study, patients actually had a longer hospital stay on average if prayed for than if not prayed for, once one discounts the patients in both groups who left before prayers began. Critics also point to a number of studies where no similar effect was found (e.g. O'Laoire 1997). Neither study has presented repeatable results subject to scientific scrutiny.

A 2001 double-blind study of the Mayo Clinic found no significant difference in the recovery rates between people who were (unbeknownst to them) assigned to a group that prayed for them and those who were not (Aviles et al). Similarly, the MANTRA study conducted by Duke University (Krucoff et al 2005) found no differences in outcome of cardiac procedures as a result of prayer.

So I guess we're back to blind faith. And I'm not very good at that.

Posted by Becky at March 30, 2006 05:22 PM