Alternative Medicine that Works

Try Prayer Instead!

There are several major medical studies conducted at the Mayo Clinic and other leading institutions find that there is a lack of evidence concerning how well Touch Therapies work. However, there is one alternative therapy that has been proven to be very effective in healing people who are sick -- prayer!

For example, out of 191 randomized, controlled studies of healing, 124 demonstrate significant effects that exceed a probability of 0.05 or better. Until recently, medical journals routinely rejected studies and articles on healing, and most healing studies had to be published in parapsychology journals. Fortunately this is changing. In the past dozen years, some of the most impressive studies were published in respected medical journals.
 
For example, Randolph C. Byrd 1988 explored intercessory prayer in a coronary care unit. The experimental group received prayer sent by Christians praying many miles from the hospital. The prayer group scored significantly lower than the control group on a scale for severity of problems devised by Byrd. Significantly fewer patients in the prayer group needed intubation/ventilation or antibiotics, had cardiopulmonary arrests, developed pneumonia, or required diuretics.
 
William Harris 1999 replicated Byrd’ study in another randomized, controlled, double-blind, parallel group trial of 990 consecutively admitted patients on the CCU. There were 466 in the prayer group at 524 in the control group. The prayer group showed significantly more overall improvement than the control group.
 
Fred seeker 1998 arranged a randomized, double-blind trial of distant healing on 40 volunteers who had against AIDS. At six months following the initial assessment, the prayer group had significantly fewer AIDS related illnesses and lower severity of illnesses. Visits to doctors were less frequent, as were hospitalizations, and days in the hospital.
 
These are three of the best published healing studies. It is also of note that they were published in respected, conventional medical journals.

The best advice that Christians can offer to friends, their family members and themselves is to pray when they are sick. Scripture and medicine both agree that alternative therapies are not the answer we need -- they just don't work. Both clearly state that "we should try prayer instead!"