Laurel Braitman

Laurel Braitman PhD is a NYT bestselling author of the memoir What Looks Like Bravery: An epic journey through loss to love and Animal Madness: Inside Their Minds. She received her doctorate in History and Anthropology of Science from MIT and is the director of Writing and Storytelling at the Stanford School of Medicine’s Medical Humanities and the Arts Program where she helps clinical students, staff and physicians communicate more clearly and vulnerably for their own benefit and that of their patients. Laurel is also the founder of Writing Medicine, the global community of writing healthcare professionals. Since March 2020 she has helped over 10,000 healthcare workers share their personal stories. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, The Guardian, Wired, California Sunday, National Geographic, Radiolab, National Public Radio and many other places. She lives on the ranch where she grew up, in Southern California.