# Gastroparesis Healing (Romez 2019) ## Intro At two weeks old, a baby boy was rushed to the hospital because he could not stop vomiting. Surgery on the valve at the bottom of his stomach did not help. Tests showed his stomach barely emptied at all, a condition called gastroparesis. Doctors put in feeding tubes, one into his stomach and one into his small intestine, and for the next sixteen years he lived on what the tubes delivered. In November 2011, as a teenager, he went with his family to a healing meeting at a Pentecostal church. While he was being prayed for, he felt what he described as an electric shock run from his shoulder down through his stomach. Afterward, for the first time in his life, he could keep food down by mouth. Four months later his tubes were taken out. More than seven years later he still had no symptoms. In 2019 a team of researchers published his medical history in a peer-reviewed medical journal. That is why this entry sits in the top tier. As is normal for a medical case report, his name is withheld. ![A medical illustration of an infant fed through a gastrostomy tube, with a syringe of liquid connected by a tube that passes through a stoma in the abdominal wall into the stomach](/codex/assets/gastrostomy-tube-feeding-infant-illustration.jpg) _A gastrostomy tube in an infant, the kind of feeding he began on as a baby; he also had a second tube into the small intestine. Illustration: BruceBlaus, [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0), via [Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gastric_Feeding_Tube_Infant.png), resized._ **The 30-second version:** A boy diagnosed with gastroparesis as a newborn could not eat by mouth and depended on feeding tubes for sixteen years, despite surgery and the full range of medical treatment. In November 2011 he was prayed for at a church, felt a shock-like sensation through his stomach, and could eat normally from that night on. His tubes came out four months later, and he was still symptom-free more than seven years on. The case was published in the medical journal *Complementary Therapies in Medicine* in 2019. ## In full Clarissa Romez, David Zaritzky and Joshua W. Brown of the Global Medical Research Institute (GMRI), Brown also of Indiana University, Bloomington, published the case in *Complementary Therapies in Medicine* (volume 43, April 2019, pages 289-294; online 9 March 2019; full citation under Sources). Per the published abstract, a male infant was hospitalized at two weeks of age for forceful vomiting and underwent a pyloromyotomy, a surgical release of the muscle at the stomach's outlet. He did not improve with medical therapy. Gastroparesis, delayed emptying of the stomach without a mechanical blockage, was diagnosed after a nuclear medicine gastric emptying study and intestinal manometry. He needed a gastrostomy tube and a jejunostomy tube for feeding; at 11 months the jejunostomy was converted into a feeding jejunostomy with a Roux-en-Y limb. For sixteen years he was completely dependent on jejunal feeding. In November 2011 he received proximal intercessory prayer, that is, hands-on prayer by someone physically present, at a church, and reported an electric-shock sensation from his shoulder through his stomach. Afterward he unexpectedly tolerated oral feeding; both tubes were removed four months later; he needed no further treatment, and he had been symptom-free for more than seven years at publication. The case meets the Tier 1 standard as a peer-reviewed report built on a medical history that includes objective diagnostic testing. Its limits are stated below: the patient and his physicians are anonymous, the abstract reports clinical outcomes rather than a repeat emptying study, and the journal publishes complementary and integrative medicine. ## Summary An anonymous young man, diagnosed with severe idiopathic gastroparesis in infancy and dependent on feeding tubes for sixteen years, began eating normally after proximal intercessory prayer at a Pentecostal church in November 2011. His gastrostomy and jejunostomy tubes were removed four months later and he remained symptom-free for more than seven years. The case was investigated by the Global Medical Research Institute and published in the peer-reviewed journal *Complementary Therapies in Medicine* in 2019. ## The event **Infancy.** According to the published abstract, he was hospitalized at two weeks of age, vomiting forcefully. Surgeons performed a pyloromyotomy, the standard operation when a thickened pylorus blocks the stomach's outlet. It did not solve the problem, and neither did medical therapy. A nuclear medicine gastric emptying study, which tracks a radioactively labeled meal as it leaves the stomach, and intestinal manometry, which measures the muscle contractions of the gut, led to the diagnosis of gastroparesis. **Sixteen years on tubes.** He was given a gastrostomy tube into the stomach and a jejunostomy tube into the small intestine. At 11 months of age the jejunostomy was converted into a feeding jejunostomy with a Roux-en-Y limb, a surgically rerouted loop of bowel. For sixteen years, the abstract says, he was *completely dependent on j-tube feeding.* A published summary of the full report quotes it saying that through his childhood physicians *used every appropriate medical treatment,* including medications and surgical procedures. The Christian Post quotes him: *Living with feeding tubes was a struggle, to say the least.* **The family's theology.** The Christian Post, reporting on the paper, describes the family as Christians who held cessationism, the view that miraculous gifts such as healing ended with the apostles, and who attended a nondenominational church holding that view. The meeting where he was prayed for was led by a healing evangelist at a Pentecostal church. Neither the church nor the evangelist is named in that coverage. **The prayer.** In November 2011 he received prayer with the laying on of hands. In his words as quoted by the Christian Post: *During the prayer, I felt an electric shock that started from my right shoulder traveling down through my stomach.* As the Christian Post also quotes him, *That was the moment that I knew I had been touched by the Holy Spirit.* After the prayer he was, in the abstract's words, *unexpectedly able to tolerate oral feedings.* **Afterward.** According to a published summary of the full report, his pediatric gastroenterologist advised waiting before removing anything, to see whether he would keep tolerating food by mouth. He did. Four months after the prayer the gastrostomy and jejunostomy tubes were removed, and he required no further special treatment. At publication, more than seven years later, the abstract reports he had been free from symptoms. News coverage gave his age then as 23. ## Witnesses + documentation - **The patient,** whose account of the prayer is reported in the paper. His identity is withheld, as is standard in a medical case report. - **His family,** who brought him to the meeting. - **His treating physicians,** including a pediatric gastroenterologist and surgeons, whose records of the diagnosis, the sixteen years of tube dependence and the tube removal form the basis of the report. They are not named in the coverage of the paper. - **The investigating team:** Clarissa Romez and David Zaritzky (GMRI) and Joshua W. Brown (GMRI; Indiana University, Bloomington), corresponding author. - **Publication:** *Complementary Therapies in Medicine* (Elsevier), indexed in MEDLINE, 43 (2019): 289-294, DOI 10.1016/j.ctim.2019.03.004, PubMed 30935546, open access under a CC BY-NC-ND licence. ## Verification 1. **The diagnosis rested on tests, not symptoms alone.** Gastroparesis was confirmed by a nuclear medicine gastric emptying study and intestinal manometry, objective measurements of how the stomach and gut move. 2. **The severity is a matter of record.** A pyloromyotomy, a gastrostomy, a jejunostomy and a Roux-en-Y revision before his first birthday, then sixteen years of total dependence on tube feeding, are surgical and clinical facts, not impressions. 3. **The recovery is a matter of record.** The removal of both tubes four months after the prayer is itself a medical procedure, and the abstract reports more than seven years free of symptoms and treatment. 4. **Peer review and open access.** The paper went through review at a MEDLINE-indexed Elsevier journal and is free to read, so any reader can check the data against the conclusions. **Naturalistic explanations considered:** - **Spontaneous remission.** As quoted in a published summary, the authors write that they *have found no precedents in the literature for such a sudden resolution of all symptoms after sixteen years of gastroparesis (since infancy),* and that complete resolution of gastroparesis this severe, with dependence on feeding tubes, *is not known to spontaneously occur.* - **Placebo or expectation.** The authors state that a placebo effect cannot be ruled out completely, but note, as quoted in the same summary, that *studies of placebos have shown only partial resolution of symptoms at best.* The family's cessationist background also tells against strong expectation, though they did choose to attend a healing meeting. - **Growing out of it.** Some childhood motility problems ease with age. That is a fair question in general, but it does not fit sixteen years of unbroken tube dependence ending on a single night, with oral tolerance from the first meal. **Caveats and remaining uncertainties:** - **Anonymity.** The patient, his doctors, the church and its location are not named in the coverage of the report. That is normal for a case report but means outside readers cannot interview them. - **What was measured afterward.** The abstract reports clinical outcomes: oral feeding, removal of both tubes and years without symptoms or treatment. It does not report a repeat gastric emptying study after the healing. - **The journal and the institute.** *Complementary Therapies in Medicine* publishes research on complementary and integrative medicine, and GMRI exists to investigate healing after prayer. Those are fair points about framing. No published rebuttal of this case's facts or medical explanation of the recovery has been located. - **One case.** A single case report cannot establish how often such recoveries happen. It establishes that this one did, on the record. ## Apologetic value - **A Protestant case in the medical literature.** Most bureau-reviewed or peer-reviewed healings in this collection come through Lourdes or the Vatican canonization process. This one comes from a Pentecostal healing meeting and a family from a cessationist church, and still reached a MEDLINE-indexed journal with its history documented. - **The Gospel pattern.** When Jesus raised Jairus's daughter, his first instruction was that she be fed: *and he commanded to give her meat* ([Luke 8:55](/codex/luke-8-55/), KJV; compare [Mark 5:43](/codex/mark-5-43/)). A boy who had never eaten a normal meal sat down to one the night he was prayed for. The prayer itself follows the pattern of [James 5:14-16](/codex/james-5-14-16/). - **An answer to Hume.** [David Hume](/codex/david-hume/) argued that testimony to a miracle can never outweigh uniform experience. Here the before and after are not testimony at all: the diagnostic tests, the surgeries and the tube removal are in the record, and the testimony covers only what he felt during the prayer. - **A bearing on the cessationist debate.** The case bears on the intramural argument over whether healing continues today (see [Pneumatology](/codex/pneumatology/)), because the family's own church taught that it does not. - **How to deploy it.** Lead with the record: diagnosis by gastric emptying study, a pyloromyotomy, feeding tubes and a Roux-en-Y revision before his first birthday, sixteen years on tubes, tubes out four months after the prayer, seven years symptom-free. Concede the anonymity, the lack of a repeat emptying study and the journal's orientation before the listener raises them. Pair it with [Juvenile Macular Degeneration Healing (Romez 2020)](/codex/juvenile-macular-degeneration-healing-romez-2020/), the same team's later report, and with [STEPP Mozambique Study (Brown 2010)](/codex/stepp-mozambique-study-brown-2010/) for the controlled-study side of research on proximal prayer. ## Scholarship Published academic works this page draws on, each matched to a publisher, index or library catalog record. - Clarissa Romez, David Zaritzky and Joshua W. Brown, "Case Report of gastroparesis healing: 16 years of a chronic syndrome resolved after proximal intercessory prayer," *Complementary Therapies in Medicine* 43 (2019). [doi:10.1016/j.ctim.2019.03.004](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ctim.2019.03.004) [PubMed 30935546](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30935546/) [open access](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0965229918313116/pdf) ## See also - [Miracles](/codex/miracles/), master hub - _schema, the vetting standard this entry follows - [Juvenile Macular Degeneration Healing (Romez 2020)](/codex/juvenile-macular-degeneration-healing-romez-2020/), the same research team's case report on restored sight - [STEPP Mozambique Study (Brown 2010)](/codex/stepp-mozambique-study-brown-2010/), peer-reviewed study of proximal intercessory prayer - [Barbara Cummiskey Snyder (Wheaton 1981)](/codex/barbara-cummiskey-snyder-wheaton-1981/), another Protestant healing with physician documentation - [Argument from Miracles](/codex/argument-from-miracles/), the argument this case supports - [Pneumatology](/codex/pneumatology/), where the cessationist and continuationist debate is laid out - [David Hume](/codex/david-hume/), whose argument against miracle testimony this case presses - [Naturalism](/codex/naturalism/), the worldview such cases press against
## Common questions this page answers **Q: Has a medical journal published a case of gastroparesis healed by prayer?** Yes. In 2019 *Complementary Therapies in Medicine* published a case report by Romez, Zaritzky and Brown on a young man with gastroparesis from infancy who had depended on feeding tubes for sixteen years. After hands-on prayer at a church in November 2011 he could eat by mouth, his tubes were removed four months later, and he stayed symptom-free for more than seven years. **Q: How severe was the gastroparesis in the prayer case report?** He was hospitalized at two weeks old, had a pyloromyotomy that did not help, and was diagnosed by a gastric emptying study and intestinal manometry. He needed a gastrostomy tube and a jejunostomy tube, revised into a Roux-en-Y feeding limb at 11 months, and was completely dependent on tube feeding for sixteen years. **Q: Could the gastroparesis healing have been a placebo effect or spontaneous remission?** The authors could not rule out placebo entirely, but note that placebo studies show only partial symptom relief at best. They found no precedent in the medical literature for a sudden, complete resolution after sixteen years of tube-dependent gastroparesis, which is not known to resolve on its own. **Q: Was the young man healed of gastroparesis from a Pentecostal background?** No. News coverage of the paper reports that his family attended a nondenominational church that held cessationism, the belief that healing gifts ended with the apostles. The prayer took place at a healing meeting in a Pentecostal church. **Q: What are the weaknesses of the gastroparesis healing case?** The patient, his doctors and the church are anonymous, and the abstract reports clinical outcomes rather than a repeat gastric emptying study. The journal publishes complementary medicine, and the research institute exists to study prayer. No published rebuttal of the facts or medical explanation of the recovery has been found.