Why Sr. Eva Fidela Maamo, SPC, M.D. is someone to look up to
They rose. They lifted others.
A surgeon and missionary sister who chose to bring medical skill and compassionate care to remote communities with the fewest resources.
There are doctors who build distinguished careers.
And there are doctors who deliberately take their skills to places where there is almost nothing with which to practice medicine.
Sr. Eva Fidela Maamo chose the latter.
A physician and religious sister of the Sisters of St. Paul of Chartres, she devoted much of her life to people who were poor, isolated, Indigenous, displaced - or simply unable to afford the medical care they needed.
In 1974, Sr. Eva volunteered for a medical mission in Lake Sebu, Mindanao.
There, among T’boli, Manobo and other Indigenous communities, there was no modern hospital waiting for her.
She worked from a simple bamboo infirmary.
When circumstances demanded it, she performed surgery with the most basic instruments available, sometimes operating by flashlight. In one of the remarkable episodes recorded in her Ramon Magsaysay Award citation, coconut water was used when conventional dextrose was unavailable.
But Sr. Eva realized something important:
One doctor could not be everywhere.
So she began teaching local men and women basic healthcare skills - training what became known as barefoot doctors who could respond to common illnesses in remote communities long after a visiting medical team had left.
Over the years, she reported training 274 of these community health workers from 110 Indigenous communities.
Her mission eventually reached far beyond the operating room.
Through the Foundation of Our Lady of Peace Mission, she helped establish free clinics for the urban poor, feeding programs for malnourished children, educational assistance, livelihood programs, and shelter for street children and abused women.
After the 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo displaced Aeta families, Sr. Eva did not simply arrive with temporary relief supplies.
She helped communities rebuild - supporting healthcare, housing, education, livelihood and eventually greater self-reliance.
Her dream of bringing quality medical care to people who could least afford it ultimately grew into the Our Lady of Peace Hospital in Parañaque.
It was built on a principle that seems simple but remains profoundly important:
Poor people deserve good medical care, too.
By the time she received the 1997 Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership, volunteer doctors, nurses and dentists working through her mission had already treated more than 40,000 indigent patients.
The award recognized her for bringing humane assistance and the healing arts to some of the poorest Filipinos.
Yet Sr. Eva herself redirected the honor away from herself.
In accepting the award, she said:
An award for community leadership belongs not to one person, but to the community.
She continued serving well into her eighties.
Sr. Eva Fidela Maamo died on April 14, 2026, at the age of 85.
What she left behind was far more than a hospital.
She left trained community health workers.
Clinics.
Schools and scholarships.
Programs that helped families support themselves.
Medical teams inspired to serve.
And generations of poor Filipinos who received care because one gifted surgeon decided that her skills belonged not only to those who could afford them - but especially to those who could not.
That is why Sr. Eva Fidela Maamo is a Filipina to look up to.