Josephine P. Briggs is an American

nephrologist Nephrology (from Greek'' nephros'' "kidney", combined with the suffix ''-logy'', "the study of") is a specialty of adult internal medicine and pediatric medicine that concerns the study of the kidneys, specifically normal kidney function (ren ...

and director emeritus of the

National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health The National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH) is a United States government agency which explores complementary and alternative medicine (CAM). It was initially created in 1991 as the Office of Alternative Medicine (OAM), ...

(formerly the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine), an agency of the

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in the late ...

. She is currently the

editor-in-chief An editor-in-chief (EIC), also known as lead editor or chief editor, is a publication's editorial leader who has final responsibility for its operations and policies. The highest-ranking editor of a publication may also be titled editor, managing ...

of the ''

Journal of the American Society of Nephrology The ''Journal of the American Society of Nephrology'' is a peer-reviewed medical journal covering nephrology. It was established in 1966 and is published by the American Society of Nephrology. The editor-in-chief is Josephine P. Briggs. According ...

''.

Early life and education

Briggs was born in

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

, Canada to a physicist father. She has two brothers. Her family moved to the United States when she was five, and she became an American citizen at age eleven. She excelled at math, physics and other sciences in high school. Briggs received her bachelor's degree from

Radcliffe College Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and functioned as the female coordinate institution for the all-male Harvard College. Considered founded in 1879, it was one of the Seven Sisters colleges and he ...

in 1966 in biology. She received her M.D. from

Harvard Medical School Harvard Medical School (HMS) is the graduate medical school of Harvard University and is located in the Longwood Medical Area of Boston, Massachusetts. Founded in 1782, HMS is one of the oldest medical schools in the United States and is consi ...

in 1970. She then completed a residency in internal medicine and a fellowship in clinical nephrology at

Mount Sinai School of Medicine The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai (ISMMS or Mount Sinai), formerly the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, is a private medical school in New York City. It is the academic teaching arm of the Mount Sinai Health System, which manages eigh ...

. She did her

postdoc A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). The ultimate goal of a postdoctoral research position is to p ...

Yale School of Medicine The Yale School of Medicine is the graduate medical school at Yale University, a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. It was founded in 1810 as the Medical Institution of Yale College and formally opened in 1813. The primary te ...

and worked at the

University of Munich The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (simply University of Munich or LMU; german: Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München) is a public research university in Munich, Germany. It is Germany's List of universities in Germany, sixth-oldest u ...

for six years as a research scientist.

Career

In 1985 Briggs joined the faculty of the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

, where she was a full professor in the department of nephrology from 1993 to 1997. In 1997, she joined the National Institutes of Health as director of the Division of Kidney, Urologic and Hematologic Diseases at the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. In 2006 she became a senior scientific officer at the

Howard Hughes Medical Institute The Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) is an American non-profit medical research organization based in Chevy Chase, Maryland. It was founded in 1953 by Howard Hughes, an American business magnate, investor, record-setting pilot, engineer, fil ...

, a position she held until 2008 when she was appointed director of the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH). In October 2017, she retired from her position as director of the NCCIH; she was replaced by acting director David Shurtleff.

Views

As of 2009 Briggs did not use alternative medicine in her practice. In 2010, a NCCAM-funded study was published which found that

echinacea ''Echinacea'' is a genus of herbaceous flowering plants in the daisy family. It has ten species, which are commonly called coneflowers. They are found only in eastern and central North America, where they grow in moist to dry prairies and ope ...

was not effective in the treatment of the

common cold The common cold or the cold is a viral infectious disease of the upper respiratory tract that primarily affects the respiratory mucosa of the nose, throat, sinuses, and larynx. Signs and symptoms may appear fewer than two days after exposu ...

. Briggs reacted to the study by saying that the center does not intend to fund any more research into echinacea. In 2012, Briggs told ''The Washington Post'' that

massage Massage is the manipulation of the body's soft tissues. Massage techniques are commonly applied with hands, fingers, elbows, knees, forearms, feet or a device. The purpose of massage is generally for the treatment of body stress or pain. In Eu ...

appeared to be an effective treatment for back pain. In 2014, in response to an announcement that the US government would spend millions of dollars on studying pain in members of the military, Briggs said that "The need for non-drug treatment options or painis a significant and urgent public health imperative".

References

External links

Josephine Briggs
at

Google Scholar Google Scholar is a freely accessible web search engine that indexes the full text or metadata of scholarly literature across an array of publishing formats and disciplines. Released in beta in November 2004, the Google Scholar index includes p ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Briggs, Josephine P. Radcliffe College alumni Harvard Medical School alumni American nephrologists Living people Alternative medicine researchers University of Michigan faculty National Institutes of Health people People from Toronto Canadian emigrants to the United States Medical journal editors Year of birth missing (living people)