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At age 11,
Emily Rosa staged a rather simple science
project which ended up in the prestigious
Journal of the American Medical Association.
In doing so, she became the youngest person to land a research paper
published in a peer-reviewed medical journal. Not bad for a fourth-grader.
How did such a young girl make such a big splash?
Emily
set out to determine whether or not therapeutic touch practitioners can, as they claim,
actually sense what they call "human energy fields." Based on this claim,
practitioners purport to heal and relieve pain as they move their hands inches from a
patient's body and—here's where it gets nuts—adjust the patient's body's energy.
Whatever that means.
Anyone with a lick of sense or the most
fundamental understanding of what energy actually means should be skeptical
of such a claim. But Emily figured out a way to test it. Her method stands out in its elegant simplicity. She invited each of 21
practitioners to put both hands, palms-up, through a screen. On the other side, Emily
placed her hand an inch above one of the practitioner's palms. She flipped a coin to
determine over which palm to place hers.
Unable to see Emily's hand, but obviously convinced of their abilities, the
practitioners reported if and where they felt Emily's energy. After 280 trials the
practitioners reported correctly only 44% of the time. You or I could have
done better simply guessing or flipping a coin.
Here's hoping Emily's JAMA study will go a long way in discouraging this
particular form of quackery from spreading further than it already has. Well meaning
nurses, eager to do whatever they can to help their patients, have actually taken
therapeutic touch courses at reputable universities. Some have begun to practice it in
hospitals. One doctor reports anesthesiologists forced to work around therapeutic touch
practitioners as they hover their hands over the patient's body.
That Emily wants her test replicated by other researchers gives further evidence
of her intellectual and scientific integrity. Maybe, following her example, other kids
will take on any number of dubious medical or therapeutic practices, which would be just ask easy to
debunk. Emily plans to take on magnets and scientology next.
Put your hands together and let's give it up
for Emily Rosa! |
