She played an important role in the development of pediatrics and child care in the country at a time when there was high infant mortality.

[1] Sara Barchilon Benoliel was born on 12 April 1898 in Borba, south of Manaus in the Amazonas state of Brazil.

In 1925, she graduated from the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Lisbon and in the following year received a Doctorate, with a thesis on tuberculous meningitis.

In 1930, she organized free childcare courses for mothers and students in schools, and a year later she founded a Crèche for female personnel in civil hospitals, becoming the director of a model day-care centre at the Hospital de Santo António dos Capuchos, also in Lisbon.

Some of her published works include "Some Notes on Maternal and Child Care Abroad" (1927) and "Prejudices in Childcare and the Way to Fight Them" (1935).