“HOUSE vs. GOD” Television Show: “HOUSE” -

“HOUSE vs. GOD”


Summary: This TV show, I especially liked. It is about a patient that is a preacher and a labeled as a “faith healer”. He has an illness and told “House” that God will heal him and he refuses medical help. There is also another patient, whom belong to Dr. Wilson. She is terminally ill from cancer. Wilson struggled when telling her that she does not have long to live. She met the faith healer in the hospital hall. The Faith Healer/Patient laid his hand on the cancer patient and prayed over her. The next day she returned to the hospital and looked and felt great. Dr. Wilson was terribly upset, because he did not believe in the faith healer. After administrating test on the cancer patient, the tumor has shrunk and she went into remission. Dr. Wilson was terribly upset, because he does not believe it was the faith healer that caused the remission. The faith healer eventually needs the surgery. House needed a spiritual uplifting, which he received. At the end of the show, he was playing a gospel tune on his piano.

Connection to psychology:

I connected this with the Placebo Effect. Which occurs when a patient’s symptoms are altered. Also the individual believing that it will work. Placebo effect is in the patient not the doctor. A fake medicine (placebo) will work due to the subconscious desire for a patient to please a doctor.

Albert Ellis: Rational-emotive behavior therapy –focuses on altering the self-defeating thoughts that Ellis believes underlie people’s behavior disorders.
Cognitive Therapy: Collaborates with people to help them notice how certain negative thoughts precede anxiety and depression.

Additional Information: Placebo is Latin for “I Will Please”. See; Psalm 114: 1-9 in the Bible. An Australian Doctor invented the word “Obecalp” spelled backwards in 1998. It was used for fake medicine (example: sugar pill). It was freely available to whoever needed it.