Nurse Profile: Sharon Pardue

For patients who come through the UAB Comprehensive Cancer Center’s Hematology-Oncology Clinic, Sharon Pardue is a warm and welcoming face during a difficult time. It might come as a surprise to these patients that their nurse is also a battle-tested, decorated member of the Alabama Army National Guard.            

Ms. Pardue is a Lieutenant Colonel and chief of Clinical Services Medical Detachment for the Guard’s Joint Forces Headquarters. As such, she is responsible for the medical screening of all soldiers preparing for homeland defense and overseas deployment missions throughout the world, including Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom.            

“My team is responsible for ‘deployment readiness,’ which includes administering vaccines and HIV tests and collecting DNA samples,” Ms. Pardue says. “Basically, we get the Guard medically ready to go.”  

Adventure and Aid            
Ms. Pardue joined the Guard in 1981 at the urging of a friend. “I had always admired military commitment and liked adventure,” she recalls. “I went to interview, and the next thing I knew, I was taking the oath. I never thought I’d be in it this long.”            

Ms. Pardue’s tenure in the Guard has taken her to many places around the world, including Panama, Romania and Saudi Arabia, where she served during Operation Desert Storm. In each country, she provided medical care for troops as well as local citizens. During her three-month deployment to Saudi Arabia, she often cared for prisoners of war as well as American troops. “It was definitely an interesting experience,” she says. “Some of them wouldn’t look us in the eyes because we were women, but many of them were very grateful for what we were doing.”

Her time in the military has shaped her outlook on the world, Ms. Pardue says. “Being in the military definitely opens your world to new experiences and possibilities,” she says. “I’ve seen firsthand how important our humanitarian efforts are. We really take our medical care for granted here.”  

Caring for Cancer Patients            
A nursing alumna of Samford University, Ms. Pardue joined UAB in 1990 as a research nurse in the General Clinical Research Center. From there she went to The Kirklin Clinic® in 1994 for a short stint as a triage nurse, and then to the staff of UAB Cardiology, where she worked until 2003. It was then that she came to the Hematology-Oncology Clinic, where she learned that cancer is a unique experience.            

“Cancer patients are different from any patients I’ve worked with in 30 years of nursing,” Ms. Pardue says. “When you’re dealing with someone fighting for his or her life every day, it keeps you focused on what’s important. Things in my life that I thought were traumatic aren’t so traumatic after all.”            

Ms. Pardue forms close bonds with many of her patients. “They become like family,” she says. “I laugh with them. I cry with them. They’re just wonderful. I love my patients.”            

Ms. Pardue is still involved with the Guard, serving as a senior nurse for the state of Alabama. She spends at least 10 days a month teaching combat lifesaver courses and preparing troops to deploy. She enjoys spending what little spare time she has with her two children and two young grandchildren. She also likes to snow ski and scuba dive. “I love to travel, but I don’t have the time,” she says. “Whenever I retire, that’s all I’m going to do.”