Iris Guzman: Caring Nature Drives a Desire to Boost Public Health

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What’s better than waking up to an encouraging text message?

Iris Guzman, thanks in part to supportive texts each morning from her father and her experiences as a first-generation Mexican-American, has developed a similar caring nature for the health and welfare of Latinos.

Guzman, who is from Nayarit, Mexico, is currently a second-year master’s-degree student in public health at UCLA’s Department of Community Health Sciences.

She has a consistent desire to research the social, cultural, and environmental determinants of health. Particularly, she wants to study these determinants in order to reduce and eliminate health inequities in the Latino population.

To further her training and education, Guzman applied for the Éxito! Latino Cancer Research Leadership Training program. The program, led by Dr. Amelie G. Ramirez at UT Health San Antonio with support from the National Cancer Institute, recruits 25 master’s-level students and professionals each year for a five-day summer institute to promote doctoral degrees and careers in Latino cancer.

“The [Éxito!] summer institute served as a motivator for pursuing a PhD,” Guzman said. “I felt like I had the support I needed to apply and succeed in a PhD program.”

Editor’s Note: This is the story of a graduate of the 2017 Èxito! Latino Cancer Research Leadership Training program. Apply now for 2018.