Konkle-Parker completes decades of ‘care of vulnerable people’ at Adult Special Care Clinic
Published on Monday, May 6, 2024
By: Annie Oeth, aoeth@umc.edu
Photos By: Jay Ferchaud/ UMMC Communications
Providing care at the Adult Special Care Clinic at the Jackson Medical Mall has been part of Dr. Debbie Konkle-Parker's duties at the University of Mississippi Medical Center since 1996 when she originally provided care in the basement of the hospital. She capped 27 years of care at the clinic April 30.
Among her many contributions to research and treatment of HIV over nearly three decades, Konkle-Parker led the effort to procure the clinic’s first Ryan White grant, the first of many grants she brought to the Medical Center.
“During my career, I have always focused on the care of vulnerable people,” she said. “I started nursing while living in Maine and gravitated toward home health, seeing some desperately poor situations. I then went to Mississippi and became a nurse practitioner, and there was an opening at UMMC in Infectious Diseases.”
A general infectious diseases clinic, the Adult Special Care Clinic (ASCC) offers comprehensive HIV care including antiretroviral therapy and laboratory monitoring, STD screening and treatment, medical case management and social work support, substance use screening and treatment, mental health services, primary care and preventive medicine services, cryotherapy for benign skin lesions and access to clinical trials. ASCC also offers antiviral therapy for chronic hepatitis B and C infection and HIV/hepatitis co-infection.
Working with patients who have HIV and other infectious diseases “is why it was important to me to be a nurse,” Konkle-Parker said. “I want to see patients treated right. I have the mindset of wanting to see vulnerable patients treated as I would want to be treated.”
Dr. Debbie Konkle-Parker, standing at the center of the back row, is surrounded by her Adult Special Care Clinic colleagues on her last day serving patients there.
Konkle-Parker, professor of nursing and the Harriet G. Williamson Chair of Population Health Nursing at the UMMC School of Nursing, is the principal investigator for the Multicenter AIDS Cohort Study (MACS)/ Women's Interagency HIV Study (WIHS) Combined Cohort Study (MWCCS) and the Study of Treatment and Reproductive Outcomes (STAR). Both cohort studies of individuals living with and at risk for HIV explore the impact of HIV on people's lives over time. Her research and faculty roles will continue as she shifts to a part-time role.
“Dr. Konkle-Parker exemplifies the three missions of the UMMC School of Nursing, education, research and health care,” said Dr. Tina Martin, dean of the School of Nursing. “The care she has provided over the past 27 years has advanced infectious disease education, nursing research, population health, patient outcomes and the development of researchers at UMMC. We are grateful to her for her service to the Medical Center and the state.”
Some of Konkle-Parker's patients have been seeing her at the Adult Special Care Clinic from her early days at UMMC.
“She’s the best,” said J. Comans of Carthage. “She does a wonderful job and keeps me where I need to be – and has from the start.”
Courtney Sanders, lead advanced practice provider, describes the impact of Konkle-Parker's work on the clinic, her patients and HIV care as “immeasurable.”
Konkle-Parker hugs patient J. Comans on her last check-up with him.“She has not only served as an incredibly compassionate provider for nearly 30 years,” she said, “but she has also contributed to the procurement of numerous grants. One of the most notable includes the clinic’s initial Ryan White grant in 2001 that provided funding for medical care and support services for the uninsured and underinsured with HIV.”
Konkle-Parker is a graduate of Tufts University, earning a Bachelor of Arts degree in social psychology in 1979. The Massachusetts native went on to earn a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from the University of Maine in 1986 and a Master of Science in Nursing and PhD from the School of Nursing at UMMC in 1996 and 2002, respectively. Konkle-Parker has taught UMMC nursing students at the bachelor’s, master’s, and PhD levels and has been part of dissertation and capstone projects in both doctoral programs in nursing.
HIV has been a focus for Konkle-Parker's research and care since 1996, when she came to UMMC as a nurse practitioner, she said.
“This was soon after protease inhibitors (a new class of HIV medicines) were first used in the treatment of HIV, and around that time, discoveries were made about the importance of viral load measurements and the possibility of full suppression of the virus with a triad of HIV medications.”
Konkle-Parker has continued to gain funding for care and research through the Medical Center. She has also authored many peer-reviewed articles, abstracts and book chapters that have contributed to the science of both HIV care and nursing, receiving the UMMC Platinum Excellence in Research Award in 2019 and the SON Excellence in Research & Scholarship Award in 2024.
Living with HIV is a public health issue, she said. “For a patient to live with HIV and have good outcomes, there must be a linkage to care and access to medications.”
While she is thrilled to be returning home at least part of the year to Maine, where some of her grandchildren live, she is sad to leave her long-term patients and the caring environment of the Adult Special Care Clinic.
“The patients have given me so much over the years, allowing me into their journeys, and we’ve been able to create a very supportive environment in the clinic with such capable and caring providers and staff,” she said. “It’s been an honor that I will miss.”