My toy , a Roush Stage 3 Mustang .
My drum kit .
At Georgia Tech Family Weekend .
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like inflammatory diseases of the eye or metastatic cancer . While being such a small organ , the eyes can tell a lot about a patient ’ s conditions and history .
“ Sometimes there are medical conditions that are undiagnosed that we discover through looking at the eyes such as diabetes , hypertension or systemic inflammatory diseases . There ’ s a lot of crossover between general bodily health and what we see in the eye .”
Most treatments for retinal disease include injections of medicine into the eye , but he does some laser treatments as well . So much of his practice is diagnostic , which he said is his favorite part of the job .
“ There are so many ways to evaluate what goes on with the retina . I ’ m truly a retina nerd ,” he said , laughing . “ We use scans like optical coherence tomography to evaluate the contour of the retina and to look at the structures of the cells within the retina . We do angiography of the retina where we can see the blood flow by injecting dye in the vein in your arm or hand . I love looking at that stuff . Sometimes I will be so transfixed on what I ’ m evaluating with the images that I ’ ll almost forget to turn and look at the patient ’ s actual eye . The images that we have tell us so much about what ’ s going on in the eye , that I ’ ve almost made my decision before I look at the actual eye .”
Back to his roots from doctoral days , he still thoroughly enjoys research and teaching . He is the director of the clinical research program at Retina Associates of Kentucky , and they call themselves an “ academic private practice .” They also have a fellowship program with the University of Kentucky to help train new retina doctors on different aspects of retinal diseases .
Dr . Purkiss and Amy met during the fall of freshman year of college and got married shortly after graduation . He said it was never a matter of whether they were going to get married ( they knew in a matter of months ), it was just a matter of when . In addition to being Dr . Purkiss ’ tutor throughout medical school , Amy has been an elementary school teacher , worked for an educational software company training teachers , and got her master ’ s in education . She is now the Assistant Director of Admission at Kentucky Country Day School . Their older son , Logan , is a sophomore at Georgia Tech and is studying mechanical engineering and computer science . Mason is a junior at KCD and recently started flying lessons to become a pilot .
During the pandemic , Dr . Purkiss decided to pursue his childhood dream of becoming a musician and bought a drum set .
“ When I was a kid , I told my parents I wanted to learn an instrument so they bought me a guitar and a book and so I strummed along and didn ’ t know what I was doing and after a while gave it up . Then I decided I wanted to learn keyboard , so they got me a keyboard and book , and I tapped around for a while and eventually lost interest . I said that this time I was going to learn from an actual human being that ’ s going to hold me to task and keep me accountable and guide me ,” he said . “ It ’ s something totally different from what I do . I have a room at our house that ’ s sound insulated , and I can go in and shut the door and sit there and play the drums and just lose myself for a while .”
It doesn ’ t take perfect vision to see that he ’ s followed his passion and now makes a difference in his patients ’ quality of life . He said that as long as he can continue to do that , he ’ s staying put right where he is .
“ I feel like I ’ m where I need to be right now .” Rock on , Dr . Purkiss .
Kathryn Vance is the Communications and Event Coordinator at the Greater Louisville Medical Society .
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