Laura Martínez de Carvajal del Camino

Laura Martínez de Carvajal y del Camino, is the first female doctor in Cuba and also the first ophthalmologist.

She is the first daughter of a wealthy Spanish family that had access to the most select circles of Cuban society. From childhood she demonstrated herself to be a precocious child, knowing how to read at four years old. Her family took charge of instilling in her good manners and customs of society, without neglecting the noblest values that a human being should possess.

She completed primary education at the school for girls of Manuela de Concha y Duval, a Spanish piano teacher. Later she transferred to study high school at the Colegio de San Francisco de Paula, where she graduated at the age of thirteen.

At this age she enrolled alongside her brother at the Universidad de la Habana in the careers of Physical-Mathematical Sciences and Medicine. The years at university were intense studies, since Laura was pursuing two careers examining 19 subjects, 17 of which she earned with grades of Outstanding and 2 with Excellent, which is why as a student she stood out for her brilliance and the reach of her intelligence.

From then on, she had to impose herself through respect and perseverance to assert her rights in a society that did not admit a woman in that position, however, despite the adversity Laura conquered the respect and admiration of her classmates through her daily work.

In 1883 she began her clinical training under poor conditions at the San Felipe y Santiago hospital, in the upper floors of the jail, where prisoners were treated. From there she transferred to the San Francisco de Paula hospital, where her working conditions improved, where she studied the subjects of obstetrics and diseases of women and children.

Due to the social prejudices existing in our country during the 19th Century, the direction of the University did not allow the young student Laura Martínez de Carvajal y del Camino to practice the dissection of cadavers together with her classmates –all of whom were male– in the Amphitheater of the San Felipe y Santiago Hospital, which was located in the upper floors of the city jail. Laura had to conduct the practices alone, on Saturdays and Sundays.

Her persistence was evident then, because she needed to study with cadavers, since without doing so it would be impossible to know the most important details of human anatomy, which are essential for any physician.

Laura met the man who would later become her husband, Dr. Enrique López Veitía (a great ophthalmologist and initiator of Medical Congresses in Cuba), at the Hospital Reina Mercedes, located at 23 and L (a place currently occupied by the Copelia ice cream parlor).

Laura was a very attractive young woman, petite in build, with lively features, a broad forehead, dark eyes and light hair slightly wavy. Enrique wanted to marry right away but Laura's father opposed it, requesting that his daughter finish her career first and then marry. Five days after receiving her degree as a doctor, on July 20, 1889 they were married.

A year earlier, Laura had graduated from the Physical-Mathematical career on June 30, 1988. Enrique, her husband, had specialized in ophthalmology and directed the Policlínica de Especialidades and its archives, and it is precisely at this clinic where Laura began to practice her profession, becoming her husband's principal assistant and taking charge of his patients when he was unable to attend to them.

Along with her husband Laura attended numerous medical congresses that were held during that time. She also collaborated with him in a large quantity of publications such as "Physiological Notes," "Clinical Observations," "Ocular leprosy," as well as in the three volumes of "Clinical Ophthalmology." In this way, Laura not only became the first female doctor in Cuba, but also became the first ophthalmologist in the country.

Laura had 7 children, whom she nursed and cared for, without abandoning her work at the clinic and even in her home, when her husband's illness was already very advanced and sick patients visited him at his home on Paseo and 1st street. She had a preference for flowers and animals, was a member of the Bando de Piedad (founded and directed in those years by Mrs Jeanette Ryder, who spent her entire fortune collecting abandoned children and animals). She studied painting on different occasions and her skill in this art served her greatly to illustrate her writings and an Atlas of the fundus of the eye.

Her husband died on February 10, 1910 at the age of 51. Because of this, in 1917 she built the estate "El Retiro," where she installed a free school for the poor, which she took charge of together with María, one of her 7 children. However, shortly after she was diagnosed with tuberculosis, and died from this disease on January 24, 1941 at the age of 72.

Source: Histología. Infomed