Megumi Yamaguchi Shinoda

Megumi Yamaguchi Shinoda (February 9, 1908 – May 1, 2007) was a Japanese American physician and was the first Asian American woman to graduate from Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons. Alongside Kazue Togasaki, Shinoda was one of the first women of Japanese ancestry in the United States to receive a Doctor of Medicine degree in 1933. Additionally, she was the first Japanese American intern at what is now Los Angeles General Medical Center. She had 6 siblings. After her father finished medical school in 1918, her family moved to Inwood.

Around 1935, Shinoda married Joseph Shinoda. On June 29, 1936, Shinoda gave birth to their daughter, Jean Shinoda Bolen.

Education Shinoda graduated from Barnard College in 1928 with Phi Beta Kappa honors. During an interview with Densho, her niece claimed that Shinoda's column was the first medical column in the newspaper. After World War II, Shinoda is reported to have returned to Los Angeles and restarted a medical practice at 224 1/2 East 1st Street in Los Angeles. Around this time, she established a new medical practice in Hollywood focusing on psychiatry.

She retired in 1980.

Death Shinoda died on May 1, 2007, in her Los Angeles home at age 99.