Distant Healing for HIV/AIDS - Full Text View

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to determine whether individuals praying at a distance (also known as "Distant Healing") can positively affect the health of people with HIV/AIDS.

Condition	Intervention
HIV Infections AIDS	Behavioral: Non-local/distant healing or prayer

MedlinePlus related topics:

AIDS

U.S. FDA Resources

Study Type:	Interventional
Study Design:	Treatment, Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo Control, Parallel Assignment, Efficacy Study

Official Title:	Distant Healing Efforts for AIDS by Nurses and "Healers"

Further study details as provided by National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM):

Estimated Enrollment:	150
Study Start Date:	December 2000
Estimated Study Completion Date:	December 2003

Detailed Description:

Significant numbers of people with HIV/AIDS seek spiritual or “psychic" treatment. Distant healing could potentially be of benefit to large numbers of HIV/AIDS patients, as it is widely available and requires no travel or other activity on the part of the patient. However, the treatment can be costly and has not yet been proven effective in a controlled clinical trial. This study will evaluate the efficacy of distant healing in patients with HIV/AIDS.

Participants in this study will be randomly assigned to either the distant healing group or a control group. All participants will have hour-long study visits at entry and Months 6 and 12. At study visits, participants will complete a demographic questionnaire, self-report health and symptom inventory, quality of life assessment, and profile of mood states. Blood will be drawn at each study visit.

Eligibility

Ages Eligible for Study:	18 Years to 65 Years
Genders Eligible for Study:	Both
Accepts Healthy Volunteers:	No

Criteria

Inclusion criteria

HIV infection
History of a CD4 cell count less than 200 cells/mm3
Stable antiretroviral regimen
English-speaking

Exclusion criteria

Inability or unwillingness to fill out questionnaires
History of non-HIV related life-threatening disease

Contacts and Locations

Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT00079534

Locations


United States, California
	California Pacific Medical Center
	San Francisco, California, United States, 94115

Sponsors and Collaborators

National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM)

Investigators


Principal Investigator:	Donald Abrams, MD	University of California, San Francisco

Study Director:	Jerome J. Stone, MA, RN	California Pacific Medical Center

More Information

Study ID Numbers:	R01 AT000485-01
First Received:	March 9, 2004
Last Updated:	August 16, 2006
ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:	NCT00079534
Health Authority:	United States: Federal Government

Keywords provided by National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM):

AIDS

HIV

Prayer

Healing

Complementary Therapies

Study placed in the following topic categories:

Sexually Transmitted Diseases, Viral

HIV Infections

Sexually Transmitted Diseases

Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome

Retroviridae Infections

Immunologic Deficiency Syndromes

Additional relevant MeSH terms:

Virus Diseases

RNA Virus Infections

Slow Virus Diseases

Immune System Diseases

Lentivirus Infections

Infection

ClinicalTrials.gov processed this record on July 03, 2008

Sponsored by:	National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM)
Information provided by:	National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM)
ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:	NCT00079534