October 20, 2009|By Frederick N. Rasmussen
Dr. Lawrence E. Shulman, former director of the connective tissue division of the Johns Hopkins Medical School who later became the founding director of the National Institutes of Arthritis, Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases at the National Institutes of Health, died of bladder cancer Oct. 10 at his home in Washington.
The former longtime Bellemore Road resident was 90.
The son of a physician, Dr. Shulman was born and raised in Brookline, Mass. He was a graduate of Boston Latin School and earned his bachelor's degree in 1941 from Harvard University.
Dr. Shulman earned a Ph.D. in public health at Yale University in 1945, and his medical degree, also from Yale, in 1949.
He completed his residency at Johns Hopkins in the mid-1950s, and from 1955 to 1980 was director of the connective tissue division.
During his tenure at Hopkins, he made significant scientific contributions to the study and treatment of systemic lupus, scleroderma and other connective diseases, one of which he discovered and described, eosinophilic fasciitis, now widely known as Shulman's syndrome, said a daughter, Kathy Shulman of Baltimore.
In 1980, he joined the NIH, where he became founding director of the National Institutes of Arthritis, Musculosketal and Skin Diseases, and during his nearly three-decade career, became a tireless advocate for research on women's and minority health and such health issues as osteoporosis, lupus, scleroderma and rheumatoid arthritis.
From 1994 until his death, Dr. Shulman was director emeritus of the institute and served until recent years as NIH emissary for clinical research to the Academic Medical Centers to "design a strategy to bolster patient-oriented clinical research, an initiative that has played a critical and sustained role in promoting clinical research nationwide," his daughter said.
His wife of 41 years, the former Renate "Reni" Trudinger, a Baltimore interior designer, died in 2000.
Plans for a memorial service were incomplete yesterday.
Also surviving are another daughter, Barbara Shulman-Kirwin of Guilford, Conn.; three grandchildren; and his companion of the last few years, Dr. Belinda Straight of Washington.
- Frederick N. Rasmussen
