The world of medicine was no stranger to Jeb Justice, MD — even from an early age.

His father, an Ear, Nose & Throat, or ENT, surgeon, taught him that it is a privilege and a calling to take care of patients. Yet Justice saw his father’s office from a different perspective — as a patient. He was diagnosed with sinus allergies at a young age.

“I always feel like I have a firsthand connection with my patients to talk about similar symptoms, diseases and experiences,” Justice said.

Flash forward years later, it is no surprise that a culmination of these life events led Justice to becoming a physician, now serving as the associate professor and division chief of rhinology and skull base surgery in the UF Department of Otolaryngology.

Additionally, Justice specializes in chronic conditions in his field, striving to improve one’s quality of life while minimizing the side effects of treatment. This aspect of his job is also very personal to him since his younger brother has a chronic condition, Type I diabetes.

As Justice saw the impact that his father had in their small Alabama community, he saw how great of a teacher he was, inspiring Justice to see the importance of mentorship.

“Growing up, I thought I wanted to be a basketball coach or a teacher at first,” Justice said.  “I think being in academic medicine kind of combined the ability to practice patient care and teaching at the same time.”

In his additional role as one of the associate residency program directors for the department, the balanced impact he can have in academics and in mentoring students guides his care. Being able to approach patient care as an entire team is very valuable to him.

Even though Justice received a passion for medicine from his father, he credits his mother with this “never-give-up-attitude” she instilled in him. In 1972, Justice’s mom was one of six female law graduates in a class size of 150 at the University of Alabama.

“She had to work extra hard to make it in essentially what was a man’s world,” Justice said.

His grandparents, coaches, teachers and other doctors instilled the idea of selflessly serving others. He believes this grounding quality differentiates others in their work ethic, motivations and overall professional practice.

“It’s meaningful to be able to take a minute of each day and reflect on the commitment, dedication and sacrifice that every physician has made to get to where they are today,” Justice said.

This is the true value of Doctors’ Day to him.

Justice says he wouldn’t have gotten anywhere without the loving support from his wife (a triple Gator!) and the privilege to be able to work with his two collaborators in the UF Department of Otolaryngology, Brian Lobo, MD and Jennifer Mulligan, MD.

Joanne Lagmay, MD, had a professional plan for her life – yet her journey wasn’t aligning with what she thought her final destination would be.

She was only supposed to stay in the United States for a few years while finishing her medical fellowship at Nationwide Children’s Hospital at The Ohio State University.

“Life has its way of telling you that whatever you planned, it’s not always going to pan out the way you want it,” she said.

Fourteen years later, Lagmay is still here, working as an associate professor and the director of the pediatric solid tumor program in the UF Department of Pediatrics.

The pediatric solid tumor program has developed significantly under her leadership and she has always felt supported by UF Health and the resources they provide to “push the envelope forward.” Lagmay considers being a physician a sacred calling – being let into a patient’s life during their most vulnerable state.

“There’s no other job like that,” Lagmay said. “It’s just such a privilege, you know, I feel like if somebody paid my bills, I would do this for free.”

Growing up with two brothers and a neighborhood of friends, Lagmay was always the caretaker. She gravitated toward children, always babysitting and watching over others. Without any medical knowledge, she knew from a young age that she was meant to be a pediatrician.

Throughout medical school, she was continually drawn to the pediatric cancer focus. An emotionally challenging specialty, but the one where she sees the art of healing on a daily basis.

Her patients teach her a lot of things and she thinks of the patient-physician relationship as a two-way street. Her patients have forever changed her.

Lagmay has also suffered hard moments in her own professional career. In her fourth-year as a pediatric oncologist at UF Health, she felt extremely overwhelmed and burnt out with medicine in general. In a desperate need of resurgence, she attended a palliative care course at Boston Children’s Hospital. After the presentation, the course director said something to her that she remembers still to this day: “Are you burning out because you got too close, or you didn’t get close enough?”

This was her “aha” moment. She could see herself in both of these respects, drowning in the mundane physical tasks or only focusing on the grief and sadness that comes with receiving a devastating outcome. This ideology was her new anchor and her new “why.”

Throughout her patients’ treatment, Lagmay exudes hope. She also reassures them of one thing.

“I reassure them that our team will always be there, no matter where the journey takes us,” Lagmay said.