Prayer 'no aid to heart patients'
Friday, 15 July, 2005, 01:22 GMT 02:22 UK
Praying for patients undergoing heart operations does not improve their outcomes, a US study suggests.<...>
This study looked at 700 patients undergoing angiograms (an X-ray of the blood vessels) or other heart operations at nine hospitals across the US.
Christian, Muslim, Jewish and Buddhist prayer groups were assigned to pray for 371 of the patients. The rest had no prayer group.
In addition, 374 of the patients were assigned
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MIT therapy and the rest none.
MIT involved teaching the patients relaxed breathing techniques and playing them easy listening, classical, or country music during their procedure.
The researchers found that neither therapy alone, or combined, showed any measurable treatment effect on serious cardiovascular events, hospital readmission or death.
But those given music, imagery and touch therapy had less emotional distress and had a lower death rate after six months <...>.
From
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4681771.stm
'No health benefit' from prayer
Wednesday, 15 October, 2003, 11:23 GMT 12:23 UK
The world's largest study into the effects of prayer on patients undergoing heart surgery has found it appears to make no difference.
The MANTRA study, run from Duke University Medical Center in North Carolina, involved 750 patients.
Before their operations, they were randomly split into two groups, and half were prayed for by Christians, Jews, Buddhists and Muslims.
However, checks revealed they had fared no better than those not prayed for.<...>
From
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3193902.stm
*
MIT therapy
- music, image and touch therapy .
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