The current challenges and priorities of MSF-Spain
President of Médicos Sin Fronteras – Spain
Paula Gil Leyva was elected as President of Médicos sin Fronteras Spain at the 36th General Assembly held in October 2021. Gil Leyva has a degree in Nursing from the Escuela Universitaria del Mar of the University of Barcelona and postgraduate degrees in nursing care in pre-hospital emergencies from the University of Girona and in Gender and Equality from the Faculty of Law of the Autonomous University of Barcelona.
Her first mission with Médicos sin Fronteras was in Angola in 2003, as a field nurse in the nutrition project in Matala. In the following years, she returned to Angola on two occasions where she worked as field coordinator for the projects in Kuvango (2004) and Uige (2005-2006).
Between 2007 and 2010, she was project coordinator for MSF’s HIV/AIDS programme in Mozambique, first in the city of Lichinga and then in the capital, Maputo. During the first years of her MSF field work, she combined her assignments with temporary work as a nurse in the emergency department of Palamós Hospital.
Subsequently, her functions have been related to human resources management, a task that has led her to different positions in this area: responsible for medical coordination, gynaecology, anaesthesia and surgery, and the emergency team. He has also been a Human Resources referent in the Operations Department.
In recent years, she has held temporary positions in different projects: from the coordination of operations in the Central African Republic to the response to the nutritional emergency in Angola or the most recent coordination of human resources in the COVID-19 emergency in Spain.
Specialised in gender, diversity and inclusion, Paula Gil knows MSF from different angles: nursing, team coordination, human resources, operations, critical incidents, training and working with other sections. In recent years, she has dedicated her time to prevention and management of abuse cases as Head of Behaviour and Ethics of the organisation.
