Andre Michaud spent his childhood in the Bay Area before his family relocated to Southern California. He returned to San Francisco with the intention of pursuing a career in advertising and graduated from San Francisco State University in 1989 with a Bachelor’s degree in Marketing. In 1990, he began a serendipitous change in his career path after being hired with no prior experience, to work as a Medical Assistant for the Dr. Marcus A Conant, professor of dermatology at the University of California, San Francisco who led San Francisco's first coordinated medical response to the AIDS epidemic. Under the guidance of Dr. Conant, Andre was provided many extraordinary opportunities one of which was to be invited to present a poster about the intra-lesional treatment of Kaposi ’s sarcoma at the 1993 World Conference on AIDS in Berlin, Germany. The much needed empathy, care, and support to others during the height of the AIDS crisis in San Francisco helped develop Andre’s interest and passion for the health care profession. It also fostered his decision to continue his education and obtain a Registered Nursing degree from San Francisco City College 2001. As a nurse, he worked in a variety of specialties from intensive care to orthopedics, but eventually found himself returning to the field of HIV medicine. At Tenderloin Health, Andre worked with underserved populations living with HIV in San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood until attending the Master’s program at University of California, San Francisco to become a Clinical Nurse Specialist in 2011. Since 2012, Andre has been working a Clinical Nurse Specialist (CNS) for the San Francisco Department of Public Health at Laguna Honda Hospital and Rehabilitation Center. His many roles as a CNS involve planning and supporting various programs for individuals living with dementia and bringing evidence-based practice to the bedside nursing staff.