Living by the golden rule
Robert “Bob” J. Wallace, MD ’82, AAHIVS, has devoted his career to HIV and AIDS treatment in the Sunshine City
n the late 1970s, a young Robert “Bob” J. Wallace, MD ’82, AAHIVS, was applying to the Florida State University Program in Medical Sciences, a grant-funded expansion program of the University of Florida College of Medicine where accepted students complete their first year of medical school at FSU before transferring for the remainder of their training to UF, which had more room for upperclassmen.
Wallace, who was not yet open about his stigmatized identity as a gay man but fiercely driven to help others, still remembers one interview question and his response, over four decades later.
“Do you think there is room in the world for a physician who is a homosexual?” came the question.
“Yes; and I don’t think there’s room for a college that won’t accept one,” he replied.
The UF College of Medicine alumnus and St. Petersburg physician is no stranger to breaking down barriers.
Wallace believes he was one of the first openly gay medical students to attend and graduate from the College of Medicine.
On Jan. 6, 2015, he and his partner became the first gay couple to be married by then-Mayor Rick Kriseman at the St. Petersburg City Hall. Despite earning his medical degree and beginning to treat patients at the height of the HIV epidemic, a time he said pushed many men like him back in the closet, Wallace has spent his entire medical career at the forefront of HIV and AIDS care and research and has founded a nonprofit clinic to keep patients at the center of his work.
When he started his family medicine residency in St. Petersburg in the early 1980s, HIV and AIDS were stereotyped as a problem among homosexuals. Many physicians refused to be near suffering patients or provide treatment because of fear and misunderstanding, Wallace said. For the first full year of his residency, he hid his identity.
“They called it the ‘gay plague,’” he said. “It was very difficult. I wanted to be seen as a good doctor, not as a gay doctor.”
-
1977Wallace accepted to the Florida State University Program in Medical Sciences
-
1979
Transferred to
UF College of Medicine
to complete his training -
1982
Started family medicine residency
-
1987
Bought a medical practice
and began openly caring for
HIV and AIDS patients -
1998
Became medical director
for Florida’s AIDS disease management program -
2013
Drafted a plan to form his own nonprofit care clinic, Love the Golden Rule Inc.
-
2015
Became one of the first two gay men wed by the St. Petersburg mayor after the state and national legalization of same-sex marriage
-
2022
Cured almost 2,000 hepatitis C patients around Tampa Bay through his nonprofit clinic
When one AIDS patient at his residency practice needed a lymph node biopsy, Wallace said two nurses scolded him after the procedure because they thought he had put them in danger simply by having them in the same room. Later, the owner of a clinic where Wallace worked for two years after residency told him he did not want any AIDS patients in his waiting room.
In 1987, Wallace bought a medical practice from another St. Petersburg doctor and was finally able to openly care for HIV and AIDS patients. But at that time, with no vaccine and no cure, patients generally died within six months of their diagnosis, he said.
“We would go to a funeral every day,” he said. “We basically held vigils to help people cross over.”
As pharmaceutical companies scrambled to find treatments for the growing epidemic, Wallace and hundreds of his patients participated in drug trials, striving to find something that could lengthen their lifespan after diagnosis. He became known as an HIV care expert and gave lectures all over the country, even taking on the role of medical director for Florida’s AIDS disease management program in 1998 and helping to start the nonprofit American Academy of HIV Medicine.
Bob Wallace, MD '82, the first openly gay medical student at UF, reflects on the hardships he overcame during his studies and stigma in his career and how it helped him become a compassionate physician and LGBTQ rights leader in St. Petersburg.
Photo by Louis Brems
Wallace also worked in industry for a handful of years in the early 2000s before taking a short retirement in 2007 to help his sister, whose husband had died. When he returned to St. Petersburg and took a senior physician job with the local health department, he worked on a mobile medical van serving homeless shelters.
People lined up under the hot Florida sun for hours just to be seen, with no shade, no water and no seats. Wallace began bringing snacks and drinks to help prevent dehydration and fainting.
In 2013, on the anniversary of his former partner’s death from AIDS-related lymphoma, Wallace sat down and drafted a plan to form his own nonprofit care clinic, Love the Golden Rule Inc., named after the cultural and religious principle of treating others as you want to be treated.
In addition to once again caring for HIV and AIDS patients and seeing people regardless of their insurance or ability to pay, Wallace committed to helping those with hepatitis C, another stigmatized illness that he noticed was infecting many of the health department’s homeless patients.
To date, the clinic has cured almost 2,000 hepatitis C patients, Wallace said. His goal is to cure all hepatitis C cases in the Tampa Bay area.
“The golden rule is all about respecting others,” Wallace said. “That’s why I founded Love the Golden Rule — to help people get treatment. I feel very blessed. I’ve been given chances to do things that I don’t think a lot of people get. I’m very happy.”
Wallace and his classmates drew their own portraits for their medical school yearbook. Wallace's is in the bottom row.
A class composite photo of Wallace in 1979.
