- Here is an old article I came across that I had saved over the years.
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- Doctor's Startling Study Reveals . . .
- Your Prayers DO HELP the Sick
- By Paul P. Levy
- Praying for the sick really helps --- that's what a doctor found
- when he compared a group of patients who were prayed for with
- a group who weren't.
- Dr. Randy Byrd selected 393 heart patients at San Francisco
- General Hospital --- all comparable in age and severity of illness.
- All 393 were told they were part of a study in which volunteers
- would pray for patients in one group, but not the other. None of the
- patients knew which group they belonged to.
- After 10 months, Dr. Byrd found that the 192 patients who were
- prayed for had suffered fewer complications in three important areas;
- Only three patients who received prayers needed antibiotics, compared
- to 16 in the other group.
- Only six of the prayed-for patients suffered pulmonary edema ---
- excess water in the lungs ---- compared to 18 in the other group.
- None of the prayed-for patients needed to have tubes placed in
- their throats to aid their breathing, while 12 in the other group
- did.
- "Based on this study, I believe that prayer is effective and
- beneficial," said Dr. Byrd, who presented his study at an American
- Heart Association meeting last year.
- "Volunteers were asked to pray each day for the beneficial
- healing and quick recovery of patients," said Dr. Byrd, who was
- assistant professor of medicine at the University of California at San
- Francisco when the study was done in 1983.
Yours in Christ,
Paul N. F.