University of Minnesota (UMN) School of Public Health (SPH) Professor Richard MacLehose received a grant award to support his longstanding research collaboration with Tibetan Buddhist monasteries in India. With the award, MacLehose and his research team aim to further explore opportunities to collaborate on healthy aging research.
Called the Lifestyle Assessment and Monastic Aging Study (LAMAS) Engagement Project, the study is co-led by Dr. MacLehose and Tenzin Namdul, assistant professor at the UMN Center for Spirituality & Healing.
In addition to continuing to work with residents of the six existing monasteries, the grant allows the researchers to expand their scope to five additional monasteries—establishing the groundwork for a future R01 grant submission to work with all 11 monasteries.
The Global Engagement Grant Program — which offers grants ranging from $1,500 to $15,000 — is unique in that it is open to UMN faculty and staff. Global Engagement Grants are meant for projects that don’t fall into one category of education, research or capacity building—in many cases, the projects blend work from multiple disciplines.
Dr. MacLehose is an epidemiologist and biostatistician with extensive experience designing and implementing epidemiologic studies and developing novel methods in Bayesian statistics, bias analysis, and causal inference. He has worked extensively on the theoretical basis of bias analysis approaches, and is the author of the textbook “Applying Quantitative Bias Analysis to Epidemiologic Data.”
Dr. Namdul’s areas of interest focus on aging, integrative health, death and dying, end-of-life care, contemplative practice, and cognitive resilience. A medical anthropologist and a Tibetan Medicine doctor, he seeks to understand the mind-body relationship in studying aging and memory through the lens of biocultural and Tibetan medical paradigms.
The mission of the UMN Center for Global Health and Social Responsibility is to advance health world-wide through collaborative partnerships, sustainable programs, and academic excellence—and do it in a socially responsible, equitable way. To achieve its goals, the center supports global health research at the UMN as well as through its networks around the world.
