David Ray Garcia

David Ray Garcia, MS, FNP-BC, NP-C is a Barbara Jonas Psychiatric Mental Health Scholar and second-year candidate in the Florence S. Downs PhD Program in Nursing Research, which has awarded him a full 2-year grant to pursue his research interests in HIV/AIDS and the health disparities experienced by Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender individuals.  David is originally from McAllen, Texas, a city on the Southern border to Mexico that is predominantly Latino, medically underserved, and increasingly burdened by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. He will draw upon his experience with this population when he begins his dissertation on the strengths and challenges experienced by sexual minorities in the HIV care continuum.  He is honored to be a nurse practitioner advocating for this underrepresented population through nursing research.

David previously held a clinical position as a Family Nurse Practitioner at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in the Men’s Sexual and Reproductive Medicine Program, treating sexual and hormonal dysfunction in men surviving cancer.  At MSK, he received training on the implantation of subcutaneous testosterone pellets as a unique form of testosterone replacement, and has published this procedure in the Atlas of Office Based Andrology Procedures (2017).  Outside of clinical practice and research, David has been an Adjunct Clinical Instructor at Meyer’s College of Nursing since 2016 teaching graduate students in the Clinical Simulations Lab.  

David is an alumnus of the inaugural Meyer’s College of Nursing Family Nurse Practitioner Class of 2014 and was the recipient of the NYU Family Nurse Practitioner Scholarship each year of his full-time program.  He graduated with a subspecialty in Substance-Related Disorders, and during his program, he studied nursing issues and trends abroad in Argentina at the Universidad Austral in Buenos Aires, and also studied HIV prevention and counseling in England at NYU London.  He holds board certification in Family Health from the American Nurses Credentialing Center and the American Association of Nurse Practitioners. In 2016 he was awarded a Certificate of Advanced Study from NYU’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development in Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Health, Education, and Social Services.  David’s educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center in 2007, as well as a Bachelor of Science in Chemistry from the University of Texas Pan American in 2003.   

Bibliography:

Garcia, D. R. (2017). Subcutaneous Testosterone Pellet Insertion. In J. P. Mulhall & L. C. Jenkins (Eds.), Atlas of Office Based Andrology Procedures (pp. 67–77). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-42178-0_10