Meet Dr. Fernando Urquiza Y Conde, an OB-GYN from Mexico City and a graduate of the Saint Paul VI Institute’s Medical Consultant Education Program. Dr. Fernando is also in a fellowship program specializing in laparoscopic and endoscopic surgery at the Centro Médico Nacional 20 de Noviembre, a high-specialization hospital in Mexico City. “There we do all types of laparoscopic and endoscopic procedures, such as endometriosis, hysterectomies, ovarian cysts, hysteroscopy, everything,” Fernando said.

Fernando started his career in medicine when he decided to become a paramedic at age 16. He wanted to have first-hand experience in life-saving medical skills in case of an emergency. “One day, I imagined that there was going to be a medical emergency,” he explained. “And I was like, ‘what am I supposed to do?’”

While attending the University Panamericana School of Medicine, one instructor told Fernando’s class that there was an urgent need for Catholic gynecologists. “When he said that, I completely took to it,” Fernando said. “I thought they were talking to me.” Fernando saw this as his calling to become a Catholic gynecologist. Later, Fernando learned about the Saint Paul VI Institute’s Medical Consultant Program through Drs. Victor Topete, Joaquin Ruiz and Miguel Angel Dominguez. Upon learning about NaProTechnology, Fernando said “I want to do this for the rest of my life. … It had all the requirements to be the cure to all the immoralities that were going around in gynecology.”

Fernando believes gynecology to be important for spiritual reasons because it involves the beginning of life. “God’s gift of creation is one of the most dignifying things of mankind,” he said. “The devil especially attacks fertility. The devil cannot create anything, cannot participate in the creation of anything. And we can … he’s going to be especially jealous.”

“God’s gift of creation is one of the most dignifying things of mankind.”

The integrity of the Creighton Model and NaProTechnology and its adherence to Catholic teaching has had a profound impact on Fernando. “He [Dr. Thomas W. Hilgers] did not conform with anything. … He could see all these things as problems, but Dr. Hilgers didn’t treat them as problems — he treated them as something wonderful that needs to be approached.”

Dr. Fernando traveled to the United States in 2021 and 2022 for the Saint Paul VI Institute’s annual Medical Consultant Program in Omaha. This was especially significant because he met with like-minded physicians for the first time. “Meeting the other students is amazing, knowing that you’re not alone. To get to gynecology as a devoted Catholic, there’s lots of loneliness. Nobody thinks like you, and you don’t want to do contraception, you don’t want to put in intrauterine devices, doing the tubal ligation, and nobody around you thinks that. So you have to go against the current and hold it. And you come here, and everybody thinks like you, is very surrealistic.”

“God’s gift of creation is one of the most dignifying things of mankind.”

Dr. Fernando

Dr. Fernando believes that NaProTechnology is not just a spiritually-sound method, but a medically superior one. “People want instant solutions,” he said. “NaPro does not offer you an instant solution. NaPro will try to go to the root of the problem, and it’s more like a curative approach.”

“NaPro does not offer you an instant solution. NaPro will try to go to the root of the problem, and it’s more like a curative approach.”

By addressing the root causes of infertility, Fernando explained this opens the window to when a woman can achieve pregnancy. “When you implant the fertilized egg in IVF, it’s only with that endometrium that it might work. If the endometrium is not prepared, or it’s not well-treated, or there’s a problem of chronic endometriosis or inflammation, it’s not going to work,” Fernando explained. “But in NaPro, since you approach the causes of the disease, your intervention is going to keep with the woman. So she might not get pregnant in the next three months, but maybe in the six months she will.”

Fernando finished his fellowship in laparoscopy in Mexico on March 1, 2022, at which point he plans to return to “the cold of the streets” in Mexico City, bringing the Hope and Healing he’s learned in Omaha to patients in Latin America.