Granite Bay resident Doyin Oluwole, MD, FRCP, still remembers watching her mother assist women in labor. As a nurse-midwife who ran a small hospital in Iwo, Nigeria, Oluwole would watch her mom every day, as she practiced medicine and ensured safe deliveries for mothers and their children. As she grew up, Oluwole was determined to follow in her mother’s footsteps—not only in becoming a doctor but in going above and beyond to care for others. “No one was turned away from my mother’s clinic because they couldn’t pay,” she recalls.

After years of struggle, not to mention a lot of hard work, Oluwole became a physician in her own right. Her impressive resume includes doing clinical research on the main causes of death in children under the age of five at the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital in Nigeria, working tirelessly to support women’s and family health for the World Health Organization, introducing the Integrated Management of Childhood Illness in Sub-Saharan Africa, and becoming the founding executive director for Pink Ribbon Red Ribbon at the George W. Bush Institute (a nonprofit that facilitates cervical and breast cancer screenings and prevention in developing countries). What’s more, she’s the founding CEO of Global Health Innovations and Action Foundation, which strengthens health systems for women in the developing world. Despite all her accomplishments, however, she’s most proud of the other medical professionals—including her own daughter who’s a physician—she’s been able to mentor over the years. Because Oluwole—like her mother—never turned anyone away.