Religion and Medicine Mix, Survey Indicates

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Religion and Medicine Mix, Survey Indicates    

Robert Roy Britt 

LiveScience Managing Editor 

LiveScience.com Mon May 1, 1:00 AM ET 

A new survey suggests the vast majority of doctors are willing to 

discuss religion with patients, but only about half actually 

initiate such conversations.  

 

And it is unlikely a physician will recommend prayer, and very 

unlikely he or she will pray with a patient. 

The survey by researchers at the University of Chicago, reported in 

the May issue of the journal Medical Care, took up these sensitive 

topics and more. 

"We found no consensus among physicians about what is customary or 

appropriate," said study author Farr Curlin, assistant professor of 

medicine at the University of Chicago. "Despite efforts to 

standardize many aspects of the doctor-patient relationship ... 

patients are likely to encounter very different approaches." 

Curlin and colleagues attempted to survey 2,000 practicing U.S. 

physicians from all specialties. Only 1,144 responded, so it is not 

possible to know how the results might have been skewed by those who 

did not respond. It is possible, for example, that religious and 

spiritual physicians were more apt to respond than atheists, or 

vice-versa.  

Of those who responded, 18 percent said they were neither religious 

nor spiritual, while 17 percent identified themselves as being both 

highly religious and highly spiritual. They were a mix of 39 percent 

Protestant, 22 percent Catholics, 16 percent Jewish, 13 percent from 

other religions, and 11 percent who reported no religion. 

Among the findings: 

More than 90 percent of the doctors said it is appropriate to 

discuss religious or spiritual issues when a patient brings them 

Three in four encourage patients’ religious beliefs and practices. 

Half said they inquire, occasionally or more often, about a 

patient's faith. 

Only 10 percent routinely mention their own faith.  

Fewer than one in three endorses praying with patients.  

But if half of physicians do not inquire about religious belief, the 

other half do. Ten percent of them do so "always." And if four out 

of five physicians rarely or never pray with patients, one out of 

five do, "sometimes or often." 

How a physician approaches these decisions depends on his or her own 

religious and spiritual beliefs, the researchers found. For example, 

76 percent of the most religious doctors ask about their patients' 

beliefs, though only 23 percent of minimally religious physicians 

did so. 

Protestant doctors were the most likely to inquire about a patient's 

beliefs and the most likely to pray with patients. 

"The close ties between belief and behavior ... suggests that 

physicians are unlikely to reach agreement any time soon about what 

is suitable," Curlin said. 

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