Following a long career in pharmaceutical clinical research, P. Elizabeth Anderson became a medical writer, working for private and federal agencies such as Duke University Medical Center and the National Institutes of Health. Preferring to speak directly to health consumers, she became a health journalist, writing a monthly column for a national women's magazine, MODE, and later serving as the Health and Fitness Writer for the Providence Journal in Providence, Rhode Island, where she won awards from the American Heart Association. She co-authored, Emotional Longevity: What Really Determines How Long We Live (Viking, 2003).