Dreyfuss Perlas fell in love with Sapad, shunned move to bigger hospital

A video montage plays before Dr. Dreyfuss Perlas is given a posthumous award at the 3rd H&L Health Exemplar Awards pic.twitter.com/KbNjcCOkdP

— Rie Takumi (@rie_takumi) March 22, 2017

A month before the New Year, Dr. Dreyfuss Perlas left a family reunion after staying with his loved ones for just four days.

His father asked him to stay longer in Aklan, worried that he was overworked and could be exposing himself to danger.

"May pasyente pa po ako," Perlas said, before leaving for Sapad towin in Lanao Del Norte.

For five days, Perlas worked as the health officer of Sapad, a fifth class municipality that has not seen a doctor for 12 years.

Work at a private hospital occupied the rest of his week.

Perlas was shot dead by unknown assailants while he was riding his motorcycle home from a medical mission on March 1.

His family received the news around 7:30 p.m. of Ash Wednesday through the sister of Kolambugan Mayor Lorenzo Manigos, who married someone in the doctor's hometown of Kalibo.

"Talagang devastated. Hindi namin alam, nag-iyakan lahat. Kasi 'tong si doctor, siya yung pinakamatanda sa pamangkin namin," said an uncle, Dr. Enrique Perlas.

The uncle received the slain doctor's Health Exemplar Award conferred posthumously at the 3rd Health Exemplar Awards by H&L magazine on Wednesday.

"Masayahin, walang kaaway, pangiti-ngiti lang. Matulungin yang batang yan. Nasaktan kami masyado," Enrique said.

Enrique came in his younger brother's stead as Perlas' father and the immediate family were still too emotional over his death.

Everyone who spoke of Perlas described the 31-year-old doctor to the barrio (DTTB) and later municipal health officer as kind and generous.

An alumnus of the University of the Philippines-Los Baños and the University of West Visayas supervised and helped fix Sapad's municipal health center—long touted as a ghost building.

Perlas supervised its rebuilding and its operation, with the help of the people and the local government.

He became a regular fixture at the health center, providing free checkups, treatments, giving medicine only to indigents who could not pay, and spending money out of his own pocket to send patients to hospitals when their center could not aid them.

Before becoming one of 498 DTTBs around the Philippines, he volunteered for the Philippine Red Cross during the Zamboanga Siege in 2013.

He was only supposed to serve as a DTTB as part of his scholarship under the program, but he came to love the work and the people.

"For five years, napili pa niyang mag-serve dun sa malayong lugar na pwede naman siyang maging doktor dito sa siyudad. In fact, kinukuha na siya ng DOH sa region," Enrique Perlas said.

"Kaya lang tinanggihan niya eh. Napamahal na siya sa Sapad," he added.

The award for Dr. Perlas, an early responder to the Zambo crisis in 2013, is received by his uncle, also a doctor pic.twitter.com/4lPhpEKnMf

— Rie Takumi (@rie_takumi) March 22, 2017

Perlas was previously hailed a "Hero on National Health" by the the Department of Health (DOH), normally only given to living public health servants and groups.

DOHSpox Eric Tayag dedicates a dance to slain Dr Dreyfuss Perlas & explains why a DOH award given to living persons/orgs was given to Perlas pic.twitter.com/iv6ke6efHh

— Rie Takumi (@rie_takumi) March 22, 2017

His death spurred the creation of an National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) task force and a bounty of P150,000 from the Lanao del Norte provincial government and municipality of Kapatagan for information regarding his assailants.

Exceptional health service

Other awardees at the H&L awards are Dr. Juan Sanchez, Dr. Richard Mata, Dr. Edgardo Ulysses Dorotheo, Dr. Isip-Tan, and the Mu Sigma Phi of the University of the Philippines College of Medicine.

Sanchez was lauded for innovating the Mobile Surgery Unit and for performing monthly medical-surgical missions in underserved areas for free.

Mata helped curbed the rise of dengue nationwide through health seminars, workshops, and training for health providers and community leaders to reduce cases in their communities.

Dorotheo is actively involved in global campaigns for tobacco control and was one of the outspoken advocates for the sin tax reform law and graphic health warnings on tobacco packaging.

Isip-Tan was noted for using social media to promote health literacy and positive health-seeking behavior in the public.

Lastly, the Mu Sigma Phi Sorority, the first and largest medical sorority in the Philippines and Asia, were awarded for various health education campaigns such as Women Empowerment and Literacy through Health Education (WEALTH).

Special citations were also given to the Hepatology Society of the Philippines for their Hepatitis B public education caravans; Dr. Faith Guirnela-Go for the Foundation for Lay Education on Heart Diseases in Misamis Oriental; and Jing Castaneda for her health advocacies. —NB, GMA News