A Mountain Medicine Journey: Dr. Bernabé Abramor
Dr. Bernabé Abramor is a mountain doctor, a co-founder of Extreme Medicine, along with his partner Roxana Pronce , the providers of care at Mt Aconcagua during the climbing season, and the director of the Diploma of Mountain Medicine, Argentina. He now is at Mt. Everest in Nepal as the expedition doctor for Furtenbach Adventures.
We met Bernabé and his team at the summer Wilderness Medical Society conference in Snowbird, Utah. Now in Nepal, he gets to reconnect with our friends at the Himalayan Rescue Association and the doctors at Everest ER. We asked him to tell us about the journey that brought him to the mountains. We are scheming plans and will have lots happening in the future. Thank you, Bernabé!
A Mountain Medicine Journey
By Dr. Bernabé Abramor
My story in mountain medicine started far away from big mountains. I was born in La Emilia, a small town in Buenos Aires Province, Argentina, a place without mountains or altitude, but where I learned values that shaped my whole life: hard work, perseverance, and the ability to dream big.
I studied medicine in Rosario and later specialized in Intensive Care Medicine at the Italian Hospital of Rosario. During those years, I discovered a passion that completely changed my life: the mountains. What started as curiosity slowly became a way of life.
Bernabé in Nepal with Ama Dablam in the background
My journey in Aconcagua was very special. Before working as a doctor, I first worked building mountain camps and later as a cook in the mountain, even though I was already a specialist in intensive care medicine. I always felt that I needed to understand mountain life from every possible side, to learn how life at altitude really worked, and to earn my place step by step.
Eventually I started working as a mountain doctor in Aconcagua Provincial Park, and that was the beginning of a stage that changed my professional and personal life forever.
Aconcagua became my true school. There I learned that mountain medicine is not only about medical knowledge, but also about understanding human physiology in extreme environments, working as a team, making decisions under pressure, and helping people during very difficult moments.
For more than 10 years I worked full seasons at altitude, participating in ground rescues, helicopter evacuations, and working in some of the highest medical posts in the world, spending long periods above 4,500 and 5,500 meters.
I was also lucky enough to summit Aconcagua 7 times, participate in several rescues close to the summit, and climb technical virgin peaks inside the same park. Those experiences helped me build a very deep connection with the mountain and better understand the physical and human challenges that climbers face.
Bernabé and Roxana Pronce, co-founders of Extreme Medicine
Like his Musa shirt? Get yours here.
After many years of experience, together with my partner Roxana Ponce, we founded Extreme Medicine, a company created with the idea of improving the quality of mountain medical services in Aconcagua. Our goal has always been to combine experience, science, logistics, and teamwork to provide a modern, high-level medical service in one of the most important mountains in the world.
Today Extreme Medicine has a large team of doctors specialized in mountain medicine and critical care, working together with rescuers, helicopter crews, park rangers, and mountain guides.
All this experience also allowed us to take an important academic step in South America by organizing, for the first time in Argentina, the international DiMM (Diploma in Mountain Medicine) certification, endorsed by UIAA, ICAR and ISMM, where I have the honor of being the course director in Argentina.
Besides clinical work, since the creation of Extreme Medicine we have also developed a strong scientific and academic activity. So far, we have presented and published 6 research papers in international journals related to mountain medicine and high-altitude work. This also gave us the opportunity to attend international congresses in different countries, presenting our research, scientific posters, and sharing how the Aconcagua medical service works in one of the most demanding mountain environments in the world.
Aconcagua gave me years of experience, learning, and professional growth. It became my primary school, high school, and university inside the mountains.
But for more than 10 years I was also waiting for this moment: the possibility of receiving a serious opportunity to work on Everest. It always felt like a very distant dream when I started my first seasons in Aconcagua.
And I was incredibly lucky that Lukas Furtenbach called me to become part of his team at Furtenbach Adventures.
Coming to Everest meant much more to me than simply traveling to the highest mountain in the world. It felt like closing a circle built through many years of silent effort, work, and dedication.
Today I have the privilege of sharing this experience with Jacob, being the two doctors at base camp this season. But there is also something that makes this experience even more special: finding friends here that I met years ago while working in Aconcagua.
Sharing this season with Luz Giménez and Huilen Pascual, who are the chefs at base camp, and also with Matoco Erroz, Karl Erglof, and Nico Miranda, friends from Argentina and Ecuador whom I met in Aconcagua, makes being so far from home feel much closer.
Everest has a very special energy. Being surrounded by Sherpa culture, living every day with climbers from all over the world, and working in such an extreme and symbolic environment is something difficult to explain with words. Every day at base camp becomes a new lesson, both professionally and personally.
Today I feel that the whole journey truly made sense. From being a young doctor dreaming about mountains in a town without mountains, to working today in some of the most important high-altitude environments on Earth.
And at the same time, I feel this is only the beginning.
