The Johns Hopkins Center for Indigenous Health mourns the passing of our dear colleague and friend, Dr. Laura Brown, who dedicated more than two decades of her life to the Center, Indian Health Service, and serving the White Mountain Apache community.
Laura devoted her career to vaccine studies and infectious disease research, always with a deep commitment to the health and well-being of the community. She was also a beloved colleague, friend and neighbor—young at heart, wise, loving and kind. Laura and her husband, Dr. Marc Traeger, opened their home and their hearts to countless Center colleagues and community members over the years, bringing warmth, generosity and joy to all who knew them.
Laura touched the lives of so many people, both through her work and through the relationships she built. We are honored to share this reflection from Gwendena Lee-Gatewood, former Chairwoman of the White Mountain Apache Tribe, who knew Laura for many years and offers a deeply personal remembrance of her life, work and legacy.
In Memory of Dr. Laura Brown
By Gwendena Lee-Gatewood
Former Chairwoman, White Mountain Apache Tribe
I took this photograph in the home of Dr. Laura Brown
and her husband, Dr. Marc Traeger.
Here are my thoughts. I can’t believe the friendly Dr. has left. ❤️
At the time, I was serving as Chairwoman of the White Mountain Apache Tribe. They had invited me to their home to visit with physicians from Johns Hopkins University. But my relationship with Laura did not begin with an elected title, and it was never dependent upon one.
I knew her long before I became Chairwoman.
Through the years, Laura always made time for me. She answered my questions. She explained things. More importantly, she listened.
Years ago, I was also a participant in pneumococcal studies. I was happy to contribute because I understood that the work was bigger than any one of us. It was about our children, our elders, our families and Apache generations yet to come. I was especially grateful knowing Laura was helping guide work intended to improve the health of our people.
Today, as I think about her life and her passing after her battle with cancer, I keep coming back to what it truly means to be a healer.
Think about the hands of a physician.
Those hands examine the sick. They perform procedures and surgery. They deliver babies into this world. They steady someone who is frightened. They work carefully when another human life has been placed in their care.
And sometimes, when medicine has said all it can say, those same hands reach across a room, hold another person’s hand or give a hug.
Then there is the mind of a physician.
Years of education, science, discipline and experience. The ability to study disease, understand what is happening inside the human body and make decisions that can change or save a life.
But the finest healers bring something more.
They bring their heart.
Dr. Laura Brown brought all three to the Apache people.
Her hands.
Her mind.
Her heart.
And there is something else I want my Apache people to understand about Laura.
She respected us.
She understood that Western medicine did not have to come into Apache country and push aside everything our people already knew.
Our people have carried our own understanding of healing for generations. Prayer. Plants. Ceremony. Family. The land. Our language. Our spiritual ways of understanding life, sickness, wellness and death.
Laura respected that.
She did not have to practice our ways to understand their importance. She recognized that medicine begins with trust, and trust begins with respecting the person standing before you.
That is what made this Western healer so precious to us.
She could bring the science and knowledge of Western medicine while respecting the medicine already here.
She understood that the two did not always have to compete. There are times when they can work in tandem, each respecting its place and always keeping the well-being of the patient at the center.
She came to us carrying Western medicine, but she never asked us to leave being Apache at the door.
That mattered.
And Apache people should know what this woman gave.
Laura gave years of her life so that Native people, including the White Mountain Apache people, could live healthier lives.
She worked alongside many physicians, nurses, researchers, health care professionals and community members. She contributed to research, advocated for Native health and helped address disparities that our people have lived with for generations.
Some of the good that comes from a lifetime like hers may never carry her name.
A child may simply grow up healthier.
A mother may receive better information.
An elder may receive better care.
A young physician may learn to listen differently.
A researcher may ask a better question.
An Apache family may have more years together because knowledge gained through research changed the way an illness is prevented or treated.
That is how a healer’s work keeps traveling long after her own hands have become still.
There is something especially difficult about losing a healer to an illness she spent her life fighting in others.
We wish those brilliant minds, gifted hands, medicines, treatments and prayers could have found one more answer.
But my faith tells me that Laura’s story did not end when she left this earth.
The healer has now been received by the Great Physician.
The hands that worked so long for others can rest.
The mind that carried the concerns of so many can be at peace.
The heart that gave so freely is home.
And the woman who dedicated her earthly life to healing has entered a place where cancer cannot follow.
For my Apache people, I hope we remember her.
Remember that she came among us and gave something of herself to us.
Remember that she respected us.
Remember that she believed healthier lives were possible for our people and devoted her knowledge and abilities toward making that possible.
And remember that behind the physician was a wife, a family member, a friend and a colleague who was deeply loved.
Please keep her husband, Dr. Marc Traeger, her family, her loved ones and the many colleagues who walked beside her through the years in your prayers.
Because healers belong to families too.
Those families share them with the rest of us through long days, late calls, research, travel, patients, emergencies and all the responsibilities that come with a life devoted to medicine.
To Laura, my own thank you is personal.
Thank you for making time for me long before I ever carried the title of Chairwoman.
Thank you for answering my questions.
Thank you for listening.
Thank you for welcoming me into your home.
Thank you for allowing me to participate, in my own small way, in research intended to help our people.
Thank you for respecting the medicine and cultural ways our ancestors carried long before either of us walked this earth.
And thank you for giving so much of yourself so Apache people might live longer and healthier lives.
How blessed we were that your life’s trail crossed ours.
You came to Apache country as a physician.
You worked among us as a healer.
You respected the medicine already here.
And you left some of your own medicine behind.
Knowledge.
Compassion.
Trust.
Respect.
Love.
Those are medicines too.
And now perhaps it is those of us left behind who need a little healing.
There are times in this life when none of us should have to walk alone. This is one of those times.
Laura’s family is hurting. Her friends are hurting. Her colleagues are hurting. Patients and communities who came to know and love her are grieving.
So now, we accompany one another.
We pray for her family. We comfort those who worked beside her. We tell the stories of what she gave. And here among the White Mountain Apache people, we honor her by continuing the work she believed in: healthier children, healthier families, healthier communities and health care that respects the whole person, including the culture and traditions they carry.
A healer may leave this earth, but her medicine does not necessarily leave with her.
Laura left some of hers with us.
It remains in the knowledge she shared, the research she helped advance, the people she taught, the patients she cared for, the relationships she built and the trust she earned among our people.
Perhaps that is one final lesson from a physician who understood both science and humanity.
Sometimes healing comes through the hands of a doctor.
Sometimes it comes through prayer and the old ways.
And sometimes healing comes because someone simply chooses to walk beside us.
Rest now, Laura.
May the Lord receive the hands that served so many with the same tenderness those hands gave to others.
May He comfort Marc and all those who loved you.
And may the good you planted here continue growing among our people for generations yet to come.
Your healing work is finished here, my friend.
But your medicine remains with us.
Thank you, Laura. We love you.
