prayer and healing

There are some interesting findings in a large study on the effects of
distant prayer on healing in today's "American Heart Journal":

1800 patients were randomized into three groups. One group was told they
"might" be the object of distant prayer, and they were. Another group was
told the same thing, but they were not. And the third group was promised it
would receive prayer and did.

The findings were interesting. Not only did distant prayer not help, but
being told they were being prayed for seemed to increased complications, the
most common complication being atrial fibrillation.

The first two groups had the same complication rates, about 50%. The third
group had a complication rate of 59%. The authors were not sure this
increased complication rate is real, and did little speculation on the
cause.
Received on Fri Mar 31 15:07:50 2006