For the past 10 years at Tallahassee’s Refuge House, Suzanne Harrison – education director for family medicine at the FSU College of Medicine – has been that doctor. This fall, when Refuge House officials selected their first volunteer of the year, they chose Harrison.

“For hundreds of women and children wounded by domestic violence, ‘Dr. Suzanne’ has been a lifeline,” said Meg Baldwin, executive director of Refuge House. “Her on-site clinic at our emergency shelter is the model of patient-centered care. Women who are frightened to leave our shelter, who are ashamed to have been abused or who struggle to make their needs known to medical providers can count on Dr. Harrison as a healer, ally and advocate. Refuge House thanks Dr. Harrison for her decade of love and professional care for women and children who have needed her the most.”

Harrison is enormously grateful for the award.

“I’m honored to take care of these women and offer them some glimpse of hope,” she said. “Refuge House offers a tremendous opportunity for safety for our local and regional victims of domestic violence and offers safe housing for survivors and their families. Meg has done a great job with improving access for victims of sexual violence and victims of human trafficking.”

Harrison – who’s also co-chair of the human trafficking committee for the American Medical Women’s Association – got her first call to come to Refuge House just about a month after she moved to town in 2003. She brought with her a long history of work with victims – and the painful memories of losing a close friend to domestic violence.

“We got to talking at Refuge House,” she recalled, “and we decided to try to include a free clinic there where people could be seen if they needed to without leaving the shelter. So I started going sporadically, then every other week, then every week.”

She plans to keep volunteering there for the foreseeable future, “in whatever capacity they need my services.”

“It’s important for the women and children residing there,” Harrison said. “It’s important for our students that somebody steps up and says, ‘This is important, and as part of your career education you need to care for these people.’”

She wishes more people – in particular, more physicians – understood the dimensions of the problem.

“If you’re a doctor, what’s going on in your patient’s life really has a significant impact,” she said. “They might not be able to follow through on whatever plan you think you created during their office visit, and they’re not going to tell you unless you ask the right questions. Even if you ask the right questions, they may not trust you enough to tell you.”

On Nov. 16, she’s leading a CME (continuing medical education) session on how physicians can discern whether domestic violence is underlying their patients’ health concerns. The session takes place at 11 a.m. at the College of Medicine auditorium.

Meantime, she’s meeting with the Refuge House team and discussing new ways to serve their clients.

“For people in our community who are experiencing domestic violence,” Harrison said, “Refuge House is a tremendous resource.”