10/05/2026
On May 10, 1884, Maria Paz Mendoza Guazon, the first woman to graduate from the first medical school in the country, the UP College of Medicine in 1912, was born in Pandacan, Manila as Maria Paz Mendoza.
She attained many "firsts". She was the first Filipina to receive the high school diploma from a public school, the first Filipina appointed to fill a professor's chair at the University of the Philippines, the first woman member of the Board of Regents of the same University, and since 1924 was re- elected to this post several times, the first Filipina appointed by the Philippine Legislature to an educational mission to the United States in 1926, the first Filipina winner of the Zobel Prize in 1930 for her work, "Notas de Viaje". She was the founder and first president of the Philippine Association of University Women and the first managing editor of its official organ, The Woman's World.
Dra. Mendoza-Guazon is most remembered for her sincere and active partipation in the struggle for woman's suffrage in the country. She was often seen in public hearings, delivering speeches urging the enfranchisement of the feminist vote. Once she remarked, "My chauffeur, my-cook, and my man servants who are all under me can vote; why can't the government allow me and the Filipino women in general the privilege of going to the polls?"
She was president of the Liga Nacional de Damas Filipinas in 1921 whose aim was to work for the achievement of Philippine Independence. On her election she said, "I have no child to hinder me in the ex*****on of my duties and I assure you that I will dedicate myself to this task of helping the cause of independence for the Philippines, as well as to the upliftment of the position of Filipino womanhood in the national scheme".
Her research on Schistosomiasis pointed to its endemicity in the islands which has been proven to be correct. Her plea that industrial hygiene be included in the medical curriculum of the local universities showed her foresight in preparing for the industrial awakening of the country.
A pathologist, she was the first to call the attention of the medical profession to "Bangungut", a form of death known then to occur only among the Filipinos in the Philippines and in Hawaii.
The Philippine Federation of Private Medical Practitioners awarded her the Distinguished Senior Physician Award on March 3, 1966. On April 30, 1966, she received the Presidential Merit Award. On May, 1966, she was conferred the degree of Doctor of Humanities (Honoris Causa) by the Centro Escolar University.
She was married to a fellow doctor Potenciano Guazon. She died of a heart attack on March 10, 1967.
Calle Otis, a street in Paco, Manila, was renamed "Maria Paz Mendoza Guazon Street" in her honor.
Source:
https://kahimyang.com/kauswagan/articles/1701/may-10-1884-maria-paz-mendoza-guazon-was-born-in-pandacan-manila
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