Friday, June 11, 2004
Study: Cancer patients turn to prayer, herbs
Eighty-five percent of U.S. cancer patients turn to prayer when they learn they have cancer, U.S. researchers said.
A study of 750 patients around the country found that most use prayer, relaxation techniques, exercise and sometimes herbs or megavitamins on top of their medical therapies.
"We were a bit surprised by how many people were using these techniques," said Jennifer Yates, an information analyst at the University of Rochester in New York who led the study.
"And we don't really know why they're using them -- to beat the cancer or to ease the side effects of treatment. Those are questions we still have to ask."
Speaking Sunday to a meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting in New Orleans, Yates said 85 percent of the patients surveyed used prayer as a cancer treatment technique.
Just last week the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, one of the the National Institutes of Health, released a report saying more than 60 percent of Americans overall used prayer or other alternative or complementary therapies.
But most of the patients said they never mentioned these outside techniques to their doctors.
"The typical doctor-patient encounter often leaves no room or time for a discussion of alternative and complementary therapies," said Rochester oncologist Dr. Jennifer Griggs.
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