Dr. Alicia Gavalya of Brookline died on January 22, 2020, at home in the company of her family after a long struggle with illness. A funeral service will take place in the Forsyth chapel at Forest Hills cemetery in Jamaica Plain on Saturday, January 25, at noon with burial to follow. Dr. Gavalya grew up in the heart of Mexico City where, after overcoming many obstacles, was graduated from medical school and, after three years as a general practitioner in rural Mexico, began her psychiatric training in Mexico City. To continue her training in the United States, she came to the Boston area where she became an adult and child psychiatrist and a psychoanalyst. She was one of the founding physicians of the Harvard Community Health Plan, the first HMO in Massachusetts. She maintained an active private practice and was on the teaching staffs of the Beth Israel and the Massachusetts General Hospitals and had a Harvard Medical School teaching appointment. She is survived by her husband, Dr. John Backman, her son Richard Gavalya with daughter in law Kim Yi Gavalya and granddaughters Alianna and Miranda Gavalya, and by her daughter Valentina Gavalya-Sandoval with son-in-law Sean McDuffy and grandchildren Isadora and Diego Sandoval-McDuffy, along with step-children Tom, Sarai and Will Backman. Gifts in her memory may be given to WBUR radio in Boston.