Former Refugee Becomes AdventHealth Emergency Medicine Resident

Tamara Djurin helps people every day as an emergency medicine resident at AdventHealth East Orlando, where she extends the healing ministry of Christ with incredible empathy for her patients.

“To have someone care for you like a family member would, right at your bedside, is a huge deal when it comes to patient healing,” Tamara says.

That empathy grew out of her own tough life circumstances. Tamara was born a refugee and homeless in the former Yugoslavia. Her parents and brother had been forced to leave their homeland to escape growing ethnic tension in 1991.

“She has a desire to give patients her best, regardless of what’s going on in their personal life,” says Andy Little, an emergency medicine physician at AdventHealth East Orlando and program director of AdventHealth’s emergency medicine residency program.

Tamara says her parents knew war was coming, so they moved the family to Germany and lived in refugee camps. When the war ended, the family’s stay in Germany came to an unexpected close. Yugoslavia was split into six different countries, none of which allowed Tamara’s family to claim citizenship, so they were forced to leave Germany.

“We weren’t citizens of any country. We didn’t belong anywhere,” she says.

It was 1999, and help came from a joint refugee program run by the US, Canada, and Australia.

“My dad always wanted to live the American dream and open up a business. So, we decided America was our home,” Tamara says.

The family’s new life in the US began in Ames, Iowa. Tamara’s personal journey eventually led to an undergraduate degree from the University of Akron, then medical school, and now a three-year residency in the AdventHealth East Orlando ER.

“I’ve always known that I wanted to give back to the community, the way the communities [where I’ve lived] have given to me. I wanted to give back through medicine,” Tamara says.

AdventHealth East Orlando’s ER often provides whole-person care to Central Florida’s homeless population. According to Little, Tamara excels in part because of her unique background.

“We sometimes forget that our patients come from all walks of life,” Little says. “Some of the things that Tamara’s had to overcome are things that patients deal with on a regular basis, whether it’s ‘where is my next meal coming from’ or ‘where am I sleeping tonight.’ ”

“AdventHealth loves to serve their community. And because of them, I saw an opportunity to give back to the community in that way,” Tamara says.

AdventHealth’s emergency rooms in Central Florida treat nearly 600,000 patients every year. With a network of hospital-based and freestanding ERs in the metro Orlando area, care is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

The original version of this story was posted on the AdventHealth news site.