Hispanic Heritage Month
During Hispanic Heritage Month, the NAM features Hispanic pioneers and NAM members who have worked tirelessly to benefit the health of others and advance the field of health and medicine in a Twitter campaign. On this page, you will find those featured in this year’s campaign, and those from years past. We encourage you to share the tweets and graphics below with your networks throughout the year – not just during Hispanic Heritage Month.
In 1880, Afro-Puerto Rican José Celso Barbosa graduated as valedictorian of the University of Michigan medical school. He was the first person of Puerto Rican descent to earn a medical degree- and become a doctor- in the U.S.
Co-director of the Emory Center of AIDS research, Carlos del Rio, is the NAM’s first Hispanic international secretary. In 2016, Dr. Del Rio received the Ohtli Award, the highest honor given by the Mexican government to those “blazing a trail” abroad.
Nora Volkow is a Mexican American psychiatrist whose work on imaging the brains of those with addiction has revolutionized our understanding of how addiction affects the brain. In 2003 she became the director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse.
Out of his concern for institutionalized racism in U.S. hospitals, Jorge Prieto, a political refugee from Mexico, built a network of public family practice clinics across Chicago. In 1985 he was named the President of the Chicago Board of Health.
Helen Rodríguez Trías, a pediatrician, educator, and activist, helped bring national attention to the devastation of HIV and AIDS among inner city mothers and children. In 1993, she became the first Latina president of the American Public Health Association.
Catalina E. Garcia was one of the first Hispanic women to graduate from UT-Southwestern Medical School. In addition to practicing medicine, she founded the Dr. Catalina E. Garcia Student Enhancement Endowment in 2015 to help other Hispanic women succeed.
Luis E. Miramontes Cárdenas was the co-inventor of the progestin norethisterone, which made the first birth control pill possible. The Mexican Academy of Sciences named Miramontes’ molecule “Mexico’s greatest scientific contribution to the world.”
This Hispanic Heritage Month, we remember Francisco Marty, who specialized in treating infectious diseases in patients with cancer or transplant recipients. His work also led to the expansion of the FDA’s emergency use authorization of Remdesivir for those with Covid-19. 
Elena Fuentes-Afflick is the NAM’s first Hispanic home secretary. She has championed equity in her work on pediatrics, immigrant health, and health disparities and is chief of pediatrics at the Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital.
Ildaura Murillo-Rohde founded National Association of Hispanic Nurses after realizing how few Latinx nurses there were to serve San Antonio’s large Latinx community. In 1994 she was named a Living Legend by the American Academy of Nursing.
Héctor Pérez García was rejected by every hospital in Texas because he was Mexican. Instead, he volunteered for the Army Medical Corps, went on to form the American G.I. Forum, and become an avid supporter of veterans’ rights.
Jane Delgado has worked to make health information accessible with her Buena Salud guide book series, and contributed to the Heckler Report, one of the U.S. government’s first publications on minority health. She is President and CEO of the National Alliance for Hispanic Health.
NAM member Eliseo J. Pérez-Stable is a Cuban American physician, scientist, and pioneer in health equity. He is the Director of the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities and has championed efforts to improve health outcomes in underserved communities and emphasize patient-centered care.
