Dr. Bernal is a pediatric rheumatologist who, after her residency training in pediatrics in UST Hospital, pursued her fellowship training in rheumatology in Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas. While training abroad, she was a recipient of several prestigious awards including Drs. Ralph and Judith Feigin Resident Award of Excellence, American College of Rheumatology (ACR) outstanding fellow award and ACR Amgen Pediatric Rheumatology Research Award. Her research works on lupus, Kawasaki, polyarteritis nodosa and juvenile idiopathic arthritis has been published in international journals including Arthritis and Rheumatism, International Journal of Rheumatic Diseases and APLAR Journal of Rheumatology. She also authored a chapter on Juvenile idiopathic arthritis for Arthritis and Allied Conditions (a textbook in Rheumatology) in 2005, a chapter on Disorders of Bones & Connective Tissues for Fundamentals of Pediatrics in 2014, in the newest edition of Avner textbook of Pediatric Nephrology on the chapter of lupus nephritis, and in the textbooks of Pediatrics and Internal Medicine published in the Southeast Asia.
A graduate of UST Faculty of Medicine and Surgery, she now serves her alma mater as Associate Professor. She is the current president of the Philippine Pediatric Society Section of Pediatric Rheumatology, chair of the Special Interest Group on Pediatric Rheumatology of the Philippine Rheumatology Association (PRA) and actively representing Southeast Asia in the same SIG of the Asia Pacific League of Association in Rheumatology (APLAR) At present, she is the section chief of Pediatric Rheumatology in UST Hospital and Cardinal Santos Medical Center; active affiliate consultant of St. Luke’s Medical Center & Philippine Children’s Medical Center and visiting consultant in a number of tertiary hospitals in Metro Manila.
