Julie Tiakoru

‘My name is Julie Tiakoru and I come from Arua. I am Lubara by tribe. I went to primary school in Masinde district until my father died and our family moved to Arua town. It was hard after my father died, my mother worked as a housemaid and we helped earn income by digging gardens.

I was determined, from when I was a child to be a nurse and started training to be one in 1980.

Soon after, we were forced to flee to the Congo by the local conflict. We stayed there a year and my training was interrupted. When we came back, I moved to Entebbe to complete my training. Soon afterwards I was married and moved back to Arua to work as a nurse.

Over the years, I have worked in different places and gained many different qualifications. I am a registered degree nurse and a registered midwife, an intensive care nurse, a paediatric counsellor and a clinical instructor.

I was the first girl from our region to be educated. I persisted although it was not easy. But I started a trend in my family as my two brothers are a nurse and a clinical officer and my two children are working as a doctor and a clinical officer.

I took the ETAT+ training and learned the techniques to triage sick patients, how to identify who should be seen first and how to assess them quickly. It is really beneficial because it has changed the culture of following the queue of waiting patients to recognising and prioritising the sick’.