Reading note: The studies discussed here date mainly from 1994–1996, with reporting published in the late 1990s. They are presented as historical material, not as current medical guidance.
Studies covered
Therapeutic Touch is a complementary practice in which a practitioner uses focused attention and hand movements near a person’s body. Practitioners have described this process in terms of a human energy field. The studies below addressed different questions: how the practice was taught, whether clinical outcomes changed, and whether practitioners could identify a claimed field under controlled conditions.
Colorado review of the evidence
A committee connected with the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center reviewed literature, examined Therapeutic Touch teaching at a nursing school, consulted practitioners and critics, and observed sessions during a review conducted from late 1993 through mid-1994.
The committee reported that the available evidence was not sufficiently extensive or rigorous to establish Therapeutic Touch as a distinct healing method. It also noted that claims about unseen energy fields require objective evidence rather than relying only on personal impressions or explanations that place the claims outside ordinary testing.
The committee recommended retaining the subject in the curriculum primarily as an issue of academic freedom and critical inquiry, rather than treating the review as confirmation of therapeutic effectiveness.
Alabama study involving burn patients
A U.S. defense-funded project at the University of Alabama at Birmingham examined whether Therapeutic Touch might influence pain and infection among people receiving burn care. Trained practitioners were compared with nurses who did not practice the method but followed a similar interaction procedure.
- More hospital-acquired infections were recorded in the Therapeutic Touch group than in the comparison group, although the numbers were small.
- One pain-rating measure indicated lower reported pain in the Therapeutic Touch group, while another measure found no statistically significant difference.
- Anxiety was reported as lower among participants who received Therapeutic Touch.
These mixed findings do not establish a specific energy-field mechanism. They also illustrate why clinical studies need sufficiently large samples, consistent measures and careful controls for attention, expectation and the ordinary effects of supportive care.
Pennsylvania test of field detection
Skeptical organizations arranged a blinded test at a Philadelphia hospital. A substantial cash award was offered to a practitioner who could demonstrate the ability to detect a human energy field. One practitioner participated.
The test was adapted to the participant’s stated belief that an injured limb would feel different from a healthy one. In an initial visible condition, the participant identified the subjects accurately. When visual information was removed, the participant correctly identified 11 of 20 trials. That result was compatible with guessing and did not demonstrate reliable detection.
The test had important limits. It involved one practitioner and did not represent every form of Therapeutic Touch practice. It therefore cannot settle all questions about the practice, but it did not support the specific detection claim examined in that session.
Colorado test of an energy field
A school-age student developed a simple blinded experiment after seeing demonstrations of Therapeutic Touch. Twenty-one practitioners participated. Each placed their hands through openings in a screen while the tester positioned a hand above one of the practitioner’s hands. The practitioner then indicated which hand was being approached, without seeing it.
Across 280 trials, the practitioners selected the correct hand 123 times, or 44 percent. This was not better than chance. A follow-up arrangement intended to give practitioners more familiarity with the tester’s hands produced a lower success rate.
The result challenged the practice’s central claim that trained practitioners could consistently detect a field without visual cues. Critics of the experiment raised concerns about participant selection, blinding, the setting and whether the test reproduced a full Therapeutic Touch session. Those objections are relevant to interpretation, but they do not turn the observed result into evidence of successful field detection.
Overall, the four studies addressed different questions and had different weaknesses. The clinical findings were mixed, while the controlled detection tests did not provide reliable support for the claimed energy field. Readers should distinguish evidence about comfort, attention or anxiety from evidence for a distinct healing mechanism.
Historical references
- Skeptics Challenge Pseudoscience in Nursing, Rocky Mountain Skeptics.
- Therapeutic Touch Document List, an archived collection concerning the Alabama and Colorado studies.
- Jon Elliston, The Pentagon’s “Healing Hands”.
- Emily Rosa and colleagues, A Close Look at Therapeutic Touch, Journal of the American Medical Association, 1998.
- Contemporary reports and responses from practitioners and critics, preserved as part of the historical debate.
Links and publication details in the original essay may have changed. The references are retained here as a guide to the historical record rather than as endorsements.