Dr. Eva Studer was born and raised in Brenham, a rural town in Central Texas. After completing her Bachelor of Arts in philosophy at Baylor University, Eva volunteered as a math and English teacher for one year in San Francisco de Opalaca, a rural area in Honduras. Eva completed her MD at The University of Texas Southwestern Medical School. She spent nine months in Paris and three months in Buenos Aires as part of a medical student exchange program, qualifying her to graduate with a distinction in global health. During her medical school years, she returned to Honduras several times as a Spanish-English interpreter for medical and dental brigades.

Eva’s interest in psychosocial and emotional well-being drew her to the field of mental health. After medical school, she completed her psychiatry residency at the University of Texas Dell Medical School in Austin, Texas. While living in Austin, she volunteered as a visitor to provide emotional support for immigrant women in the T. Don Hutto detention center, many of whom were from Latin America. In addition, she created a global mental health elective, spending one month rotating at the Fundación Santa Fe de Bogotá University Hospital in Colombia. Eva also helped initiate a psychological evaluation program for refugees seeking asylum in Austin. She joined the Physicians for Human Rights Asylum Evaluation Network in 2020 and volunteers for this organization by providing psychiatric evaluations for individuals seeking asylum, about 50% of whom come from Central or South America.
After finishing her residency, Eva joined the University of California San Francisco Health Equity Action Leadership (HEAL) Initiative as a Global Mental Health Fellow. Through this fellowship, Eva spent six months in Chiapas, Mexico, working with Partners in Health (PIH) as a psychiatric consultant. During these six months, she provided direct supervision and mental health education to doctors completing their social service year in rural communities of the Sierra Madre. She continues to provide monthly supervision to PCPs in Chiapas as part of a collaborative care project to help bridge the gap in mental health services in Chiapas.

Currently, Eva is completing her final fellowship rotation at the Chinle Counseling Services in Chinle, Arizona. In this position, she provides outpatient and consult-liaison psychiatric care for Navajo individuals. Eva is also a candidate for the Master’s in Public Health Leadership online degree program through the University of North Texas Health Science Center in Fort Worth, Texas. She plans to return to Mexico once she has finished her fellowship to continue serving the mental health needs of the people of Chiapas with her colleagues at PIH.