Celebrating the Life of Calvin R. Brown, Jr., MD, Rheumatologist and Teacher
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The rheumatology community lost clinician and educator Calvin R. Brown, MD, on Dec. 1, 2019. He was 66 years old. His final years were spent at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, practicing rheumatology and training fellows in the specialty.
“I worked side by side with Cal in clinic for over 10 years, and I feel his loss daily, as do the rest of his colleagues and friends at Northwestern,” Eric M. Ruderman, MD, professor of medicine and associate chief of clinical affairs in the division of rheumatology at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, told Healio Rheumatology. “Cal was the quintessential educator.”
Ruderman highlighted that Brown was the longest-serving rheumatology fellowship program director in the country. “Cal devoted his career to the education and training of the next generations of clinical and academic rheumatologists,” he said. “Cal will be missed dearly, but his legacy lives on in the dozens of rheumatologists whose lives he touched during their formative years.”
Born in Lakeview, Ohio, and raised in Franklin, Michigan, Brown began his higher education with Bachelor of Science from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. He went on to obtain his medical degree from Wayne State University, also in Michigan. His career took him to a faculty and staff position at Rush University in Chicago, where he was a key player in developing the division of rheumatology and founding the rheumatology fellowship program. He ultimately landed at Northwestern, where he served as the Rheumatology Fellowship Director since 2008.
In addition, Brown was active in the American College of Rheumatology, serving on the Board of Directors of the Rheumatology Research Foundation and as a member of the Committee on Communication & Marketing and the Committee on Rheumatology Training & Workforce Issues. Never one to rest, Brown also contributed to the Chicago Rheumatism Society and the Arthritis Foundation.
“The Arthritis Foundation has lost a great friend and supporter, Dr. Calvin Brown,” Rowland W. (Bing) Chang, MD, MPH, immediate past National Board Chair of the Arthritis Foundation, said in an interview. “Cal was an extraordinarily caring person toward his patients, his trainees and his peers. He was always engaged with making organizations that he belonged to better, whether it be the Arthritis Foundation, both locally in Chicago and nationally, Northwestern, within his division and department but also as a medical school and university, or the American College of Rheumatology. We will miss his candor, his humor and his love.”
Beyond the clinic, Brown was most likely to be found on a bicycle, riding on surfaces ranging from blacktop to gravel, testing his endurance going up and down mountains. His most significant accomplishment on a bike was completing the 200-mile Lotoja event, which ran from Logan, Utah, to Jackson, Wyoming.
“Cal was an outstanding rheumatologist and an outstanding human being,” Leonard H. Calabrese, DO, chief medical editor of Healio Rheumatology and the director of the RJ Fasenmyer Center for Clinical Immunology at the Cleveland Clinic, said in an interview. “He was well loved by his peers and well loved by those that he trained, and his presence in our community will be sorely missed.”
Brown is survived by his wife Joann, whom he married in 1982, his daughter Sara, his brother Charles, and his sisters Julie and Carolyn. – by Rob Volansky