“I went to lots of funerals, and I saw a lot of personal friends pass away from it, too,” said Brandt, 72.
After that first patient died, he decided to close his Xenia office on Monday afternoons in order to volunteer at Miami Valley Hospital’s Infectious Disease Clinic. There were no treatments for HIV at the time, but he learned to treat opportunistic infections that he hadn’t encountered in medical school.
Credit: Jim Noelker
Credit: Jim Noelker
The more he saw, the more frustrated he became.
“Patients would come in with more than just HIV-related problems,” he said, adding that many needed supportive care, home health care and help with mental health, substance abuse, nutrition, housing and transportation.
Many such patients were abandoned by primary care doctors, who were uninformed or afraid of meeting their needs due to their HIV status, Brandt said.
He wanted to further help these patients, and from a primary care point of view. He spent the rest of his career doing that, moving his office from Xenia to Dayton and offering primary and HIV-related care.
He estimated that he has treated at least 1,500 to 2,000 HIV/AIDS patients over the years, while also becoming certified in addiction medicine and credentialed as an HIV subspecialist.
Leslie Loper, who nominated Brandt as a Dayton Daily News Community Gem, called him a kind and giving person who has made an impact throughout the area.
“He saved lives, he impacted people, he educated people. Not every community has somebody like him,” said the Kettering woman, who has known Brandt for about 40 years while working in the AIDS field.
Brandt said there were multiple reasons that he decided to continue to focus on HIV/AIDS patients.
“A lot of it had to do with the fact that nobody else was doing it, and I felt a responsibility because I was gay and I didn’t come out until after medical school,” he said.
The stigma surrounding HIV, while still there, has lessened over the decades, and the transmission rate has decreased. Those who are diagnosed are living longer, and treatment is easy – in fact, Brandt said that treating HIV is easier than diabetes.
The Oakwood man left his solo practice in 2008 and joined the Department of Family Medicine at the Boonshoft School of Medicine. He retired from seeing patients in 2018.
Brandt, who has lived in the Dayton area since 1970, attended the Dayton Art Institute for a year before transferring to Wright State as an undergraduate, and he remains a supporter of the arts. Among the many causes he supports is the Levitt Pavilion, and he is on the board of The Contemporary Dayton Visual Arts Center and is a member of the DAI Jefferson Patterson Society.
He also is an active member of the local LGBTQ+ Health Alliance Committee and the United Church Homes Longfellow Commons Advisory Council.
Brandt said he knows what it is like to feel like an underdog, and the underdog became the type of person whom he likes to help.
“People need to have compassion for others no matter what their situation is,” Brandt said. “We’re all human beings, we all have our frailties, we all need help.”
About the Author