Does prayer help to heal? It's not hard to find claims like these in the media or on the web from time to time. Is there any scientifically verifiable evidence that prayer (in addition to appropriate medical/surgical treatment) has a benefit for a patient? Please keep answers to _demonstrable_ evidence, such as: * Do prayed-for patients heal faster after surgery? * Do they have lower rates of post-operative infection? * Do they statistically demonstrate better outcomes?

The American Heart Journal has published a three-year study of the therapeutic effects of intercessory prayer of 1800 patients undergoing heart bypass surgery.

The study divided subjects into three groups: those receiving no intercessory prayer, those that did, but didn’t know about it, and those that did and _did_ know about it.

Its conclusion is very clear indeed:

> Intercessory prayer itself had no effect on complication-free recovery from CABG, but certainty of receiving intercessory prayer was associated with a higher incidence of complications.

In other words: **prayer doesn’t help**. And **if you know that you are prayed for, you do worse**. Only slightly, but statistically significantly.

Scientific American has published a break-down of the study and its results.