Jennifer’s Journey Into the Infectious Disease Field

Meet Jennifer Calicoat, APRN – CNP, who works at Mercy Health – Springfield Regional Medical Center! Jennifer’s career with our ministry began 34 years ago. Today, she works in our infectious disease department with her collaborating physician, Luke Onuorah, MD.

What initially drew Jennifer to become a nurse was her brother, who passed away at the age of 26. Jennifer grew up helping take care of him.

“I helped to care for my brother from an early age and this led me to wanting to care for others,” she explains.

Jennifer grew up and still lives in Springfield, Ohio.

“I feel our patient community deserves the best local care possible,” Jennifer says. “I want to give back to my community. Springfield Regional Medical Center has stayed very up to date with equipment, great providers from all over the globe as well as growing and changing with the needs of the community.”

When asked what her professional journey has looked like so far, Jennifer shares that becoming a nurse practitioner has been a huge learning curve because she had been a nurse for so long. 

“I am constantly learning something new and have been able to add to my past experiences to shape who I now am as a nurse practitioner,” she says. “I entered the specialty of infectious disease and have found that it ties all my past knowledge together to truly care for the patient in a much better and fulfilling way. This specialty has allowed me to grow so much.”

As for the most rewarding aspect of Jennifer’s job, this is caring for patients as well as the clinical aspect of being a provider.

“I feel fulfilled every day when I see patients improve and I love being part of their care team,” Jennifer says. “I feel very rewarded when I can add something new to the patients’ care and have them turn around from a critical state to showing improvement. As an infectious disease provider, I can add to the patients’ care by looking at the whole patient, all body systems and add to their plan of care to help with the turning point to their recovery.”

The patient population Jennifer cares for ranges from those in the acute illness phase to patients who are chronically ill and/or immunocompromised in some way. Patients are most likely to seek treatment from Jennifer when they are experiencing an infectious, inflammatory process or a suspected infection. Her team assists with managing these patients, as well as investigating the source of the infection and to eradicate or manage the infection.

“It is a daily challenge to make sure I am keeping up with the current evidence-based research and guidelines to provide my patients with the best and most current care possible,” she explains. “Overall, I am so excited to be part of the team of providers at Springfield Regional Medical Center. We all want to help keep our care at its best.”

Outside of work Jennifer enjoys spending time with her husband, three grown children and their dog.

“God and my family are the cornerstones of my life. I have been so blessed to have a wonderful family. I am looking forward to my daughter’s wedding in September. Helping plan the wedding and keeping up with my children keeps me very busy!”

Learn more about the infectious disease care services we provide at Mercy Health.