Mark A. Díaz, M.D., is a co-founder of the National Hispanic Medical Association and a co-founder of the National Hispanic Health Foundation, where he serves as Chair of the Board of Directors. A board-certified family physician and occupational medicine specialist, he has devoted more than four decades to clinical practice, medical education, public service, and national health leadership. His career has been guided by an enduring purpose: to create pathways into medical education and health careers for individuals who might otherwise lack the means or institutional support to pursue them, and to connect those opportunities with service in communities where healthcare needs are greatest. A native Spanish speaker and first-generation college graduate, he has pursued this purpose through mentorship and institution-building.

Dr. Díaz has also helped establish and govern organizations with national reach. He was a founding member of the National Hispanic Pharmacists Association and serves on its Board of Directors. His broader institutional service includes membership on the Cal Aggie Alumni Association Board of Directors and the UCSF Alumni Association Board of Directors. He is co-chair of the UCSF Chicanx Latinx Alumni Association and serves on the University of California Chicanx Latinx Alumni Association Legislative Committee. Across these roles, he has advanced representation, leadership, and opportunity throughout the health professions.

The architecture of this commitment was already visible during Dr. Díaz’s undergraduate years at the University of California, Davis. In 1972, he co-founded Chicanos in Health Education, a Latino premedical organization supporting students preparing for careers in medicine and the health professions. Two years later, he co-founded Clínica Tepati, a student-run free clinic serving Spanish-speaking patients and others facing barriers to care in Sacramento. He has remained involved with Clínica Tepati throughout his professional life, including as a volunteer physician preceptor. Together, these initiatives gave early and enduring expression to the principle that would define his life’s work: opening doors into medicine while extending care beyond them.

Dr. Díaz earned his Bachelor of Science in Biological Sciences from UC Davis and his medical degree from the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine in 1979. He completed his family medicine residency at UC Davis Medical Center in 1982 and a Song-Brown Family Medicine Fellowship in 1983, and later completed the Occupational and Environmental Medicine Program at UCSF. His clinical career has encompassed family medicine, urgent care, occupational medicine, medical directorship, and nearly three decades in private practice. He has also provided medical expertise to several California public agencies and currently serves as a medical consultant to the California Public Employees’ Retirement System.

In academic medicine, Dr. Díaz is a Volunteer Clinical Professor in the Department of Family and Community Medicine at UC Davis and a Volunteer Clinical Assistant Professor at California Northstate University College of Medicine. His service has included clinical teaching, medical school admissions, and sustained mentorship of students entering the health professions. He also serves as a volunteer preceptor at the Knights Landing One Health Center, uniting community service with experiential education.

As Chairman of the Emundi Foundation Board of Directors, Dr. Díaz brings a record closely aligned with the Foundation’s mission: physician leadership, educational pathway development, institutional governance, and service to communities with unmet health needs. His leadership will help guide the Foundation as it builds an enduring medical institution designed to recognize promise, expand opportunity, prepare physicians for lives of service, and strengthen the healthcare workforce of California’s North State for generations to come.