Lundy Braun

Lundy Braun
Died	August 9th 2024 Rhode Island, US
Education	Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Occupation	Pathologist
Medical career
Profession	Professor Emerita
Institutions	Brown University
Research	Africana studies Race adjustment
Awards	Ludwik Fleck Prize (2018)

Lundy Braun was a professor of pathology and laboratory medicine, and Africana studies at Brown University, United States, who researched history of racial health disparities. She wrote Breathing Race Into the Machine: The Surprising Career of the Spirometer From Plantation to Genetics (2014), which looks at the history of correcting for race in spirometers, and for which she received the Ludwik Fleck Prize in 2018.

Career

Lundy Braun received her PhD from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in 1982. ^[1]

Braun studied differences in health relating to race, and was professor of pathology and laboratory medicine and Africana studies. Her reviews of research around algorithms using race adjustments found that race is not often defined, and she raised the question of the role of race in medicine. ^[2] Her research paper "Defining race/ethnicity and explaining difference in research studies on lung function", published in the European Respiratory Journal in 2012, looked at almost 100 years of research pertaining to lung disease. ^[3]

She wrote Breathing Race Into the Machine: The Surprising Career of the Spirometer From Plantation to Genetics (2014), which looked at the history of correcting for race in spirometers, and for which she received the Ludwik Fleck Prize in 2018. ^{[4] [5] [6] [7]}

In 2023, she retired and became professor emerita. On August 9, 2024, at the age of 77, she was killed after being struck by an automobile while walking near her home. ^[8]

Selected publications

• Braun, Lundy; Wolfgang, Melanie; Dickersin, Kay (1 January 2012). "Defining race/ethnicity and explaining difference in research studies on lung function". European Respiratory Journal. 41 (6): 1362–1370. doi: 10.1183/09031936.00091612 . ISSN   0903-1936. PMID   22878881. S2CID   3092122. (Co-author)
• Braun, L. (2015). "Race, ethnicity and lung function: A brief history". Canadian Journal of Respiratory Therapy. 51 (4): 99–101. ISSN   1205-9838. PMC   4631137 . PMID   26566381.
• Braun, L. (24 October 2020). "Race Correction and Spirometry: Why History Matters". Chest . 159 (4): 1670–1675. doi: 10.1016/j.chest.2020.10.046 . ISSN   0012-3692. PMID   33263290.

References

1. "Race & Public Health | The Office of the Provost | Brown University". www.brown.edu. Retrieved 18 April 2021.
2. Brown. "Spirometry: A built-in 'correction' for race?". news.brown.edu. Archived from the original on 5 March 2021. Retrieved 18 April 2021.
3. Chowkwanyun, Merlin (23 May 2013). "Race Is Not Biology". The Atlantic. Archived from the original on 30 March 2021. Retrieved 18 April 2021.
4. Kahn, Jonathan (1 February 2015). "Review of Lundy Braun, Breathing Race Into the Machine: The Surprising Career of the Spirometer From Plantation to Genetics" . The American Journal of Bioethics. 15 (2): W5 –W6. doi:10.1080/15265161.2014.990586. ISSN   1526-5161. S2CID   71215823.
5. Braun, Lundy (2014). Breathing Race into the Machine: The Surprising Career of the Spirometer from Plantation to Genetics. University of Minnesota Press. ISBN   9780816683574. JSTOR   10.5749/j.ctt5vkbdf.
6. "Lundy Braun wins book award | Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine | Brown University". www.brown.edu. Archived from the original on 27 January 2019. Retrieved 18 April 2021.
7. "Lundy Braun". Society for Social Studies of Science. Retrieved 18 April 2021.
8. "Brown University Professor Emerita dedicated life to researching race and medicine". WJAR10. 13 August 2024.