Fingerprints of God_ The Search for the Science of Spirituality - Barbara Bradley Hagerty [137]
6 J. Kabat-Zinn and his colleagues studied psoriasis, which is an uncontrolled cell proliferation of a layer of the skin and can cover the whole body. Stress makes it worse. The researchers found that those who consciously reduced their stress levels through meditation healed more quickly than those who used only mainstream treatments. For those who meditated, the condition cleared in 100 days, compared with 125 days for those who did not meditate. J. Kabat-Zinn et al., “Influence of a Mindfulness Meditation-Based Stress Reduction Intervention on Rates of Skin Clearing in Patients with Moderate to Severe Psoriasis Undergoing Phototherapy (UVB) and Photochemotherapy (PUVA),” Psychosomatic Medicine 60 (1998): 625-32.
7 G. Ironson, R. Stuetzle, and M. A. Fletcher, “An Increase in Religiousness/Spirituality Occurs After HIV Diagnosis and Predicts Slower Disease Progression Over 4 Years in People with HIV,” Journal of General Internal Medicine 21 (supplement; 2006): S62-68.
8 G. Ironson et al., “View of God Is Associated with Disease Progression in HIV.” Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Society of Behavioral Medicine, March 22-25, 2006, San Francisco. Abstract published in Annals of Behavioral Medicine 31 (supplement): S074.
9 G. Ironson at al., “The Ironson-Woods Spirituality/Religiousness Index Is Associated with Long Survival, Health Behaviors, Less Stress, and Low Cortisol in People with HIV/ AIDS,” Annals of Behavioral Medicine 24, no. 1: 34-38 (special issue on religion and health).
10 R. C. Byrd, “Positive Therapeutic Effects of Intercessory Prayer in a Coronary Care Unit,” Southern Medical Journal 81 (1988): 826-29.
11 F. Sicher and colleagues followed forty patients with advanced AIDS. Half received different types of prayer and psychic healing for ten weeks; the other half did not. The patients receiving prayer developed fewer AIDS-defining illnesses, experienced less severe illness when they were sick, made fewer trips to the hospital or their doctors, and spent less time in the hospital. However, there were no significant differences in CD4 cell counts, a biological measure that charts the progression of the disease. F. Sicher et al., “A Randomized, Double-Blind Study of the Effects of Distant Healing in a Population with Advanced AIDS,” Western Journal of Medicine 169, no. 6 (1998): 356-63.
12 W. S. Harris studied 990 patients admitted to a coronary care unit at a private hospital. Prayer intercessors were each given the first name of one patient (and it was guaranteed that each did not know the patient) and prayed for that patient every day for four weeks. Half of the patients received no prayer. The group receiving prayer did better overall. W. S. Harris et al., “A Randomized, Controlled Trial of the Effects of Remote Intercessory Prayer on Outcomes in Patients Admitted to the Coronary Care Unit,” Archives of Internal Medicine 159 (1999): 22-78.
13 The 219 women were in Seoul, while the prayer groups lived in the United States, Canada, and Australia. K. Y. Cha, D. P. Wirth, and R. A. Lobo, “Does Prayer Influence the Success of In Vitro Fertilization-Embryo Transfer? Report of a Masked, Randomized Trial,” Journal of Reproductive Medicine 46 (2001): 781-87. Later, one of the researchers was found guilty of fraud in an unrelated study, which cast doubt on these findings in the minds of many researchers.
14 I love this study. Twenty-two bush babies (Otolemur garnettii) with “chronically self-injurious behavior” were monitored