Since selling her private practice eight years ago, Dr. Gulshan Harjee has spent most of her professional career invested in the Clarkston Community Health Center, a charity clinic she co-founded that serves a steady flow of immigrant patients.
The internal medicine physician came to the United States after fleeing three different countries in her childhood and adolescent years — experiences that moved her to help others in trying circumstances. As the pro bono medical director of the Clarkston charitable clinic, Harjee sees patients in a town where about half the residents are foreign-born and nearly 1 in 5 are uninsured.
“I left a thriving practice to do this because I was paying it forward,” she said.
Unlike Harjee, who trained at Morehouse and Emory medical schools in Atlanta, many other immigrant doctors struggle to practice medicine in Georgia. Those who received medical degrees outside the United States often face difficulty competing with American-trained doctors for a limited number of residency spots…