Elinor Catherine Hamlin, AC, FRCS, FRANZCOG, FRCOG (née Nicholson; 24 January 1924 – 18 March 2020) was an Australian obstetrician and gynaecologist who, with her husband, New Zealander Reginald Hamlin, co-founded the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital, the world's only medical centre dedicated exclusively to providing free obstetric fistula repair surgery to poor women with childbirth injuries.

In 1950, she married New Zealander Reginald Hamlin QSO OBE, a physician and medical superintendent at Crown Street.

[4] In 1958, the Hamlins replied to an advertisement placed by the Ethiopian government in The Lancet medical journal for an obstetrician and gynaecologist to establish a midwifery school at the Princess Tsehai Hospital in Addis Ababa,[5] the hospital established by the emperor in honor of his daughter and grandchild who had died in childbirth.

Called Desta Mender (Amharic for 'Joy Village'), the facility was built on land donated by the Ethiopian government.

[12] Patients at the rehabilitation and reintegration centre undergo literacy and numeracy classes, counselling[13] and vocational training.

[16] On 1 January 2001, Hamlin was awarded the Centenary Medal by the Australian government for "long and outstanding service to international development in Africa".

[2] Hamlin was described as a "modern-day Mother Teresa" in an editorial by Pulitzer Prize–winning writer Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times.

The 2007 documentary, "A Walk to Beautiful" featured five Ethiopian women who were treated by Hamlin and her team at the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital.

[21][22] Hamlin was among 50 prominent Australians invited by the Governor-General of Australia, Dame Quentin Bryce, to take lunch with Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh at Government House, Canberra on 23 October 2011.

[24] In 2019, Hamlin celebrated the 60th anniversary of her arrival in Ethiopia at a ceremony at the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital.