Joanne C. Mendoza MD, FAAP

Dr. Mendoza is an assistant professor of pediatrics at UVA. She was born and raised in Zimbabwe, where from the age of 12 she knew she wanted to be a doctor. She had many unique experiences living in a low-to-middle-income country prior to moving to the U.S. for college. She attended Messiah College and Penn State University College of Medicine, then moved to Atlanta for a pediatric residency at Emory University, where she met her husband. Following her residency, Dr. Mendoza completed a pediatric hospital medicine fellowship, also at Emory, where she became passionate about quality improvement and global health. She practiced at Emory/Children's Healthcare of Atlanta for a few years while her husband completed his fellowship, and then moved to Charlottesville to join UVA in 2016.

She recently completed additional improvement science training at Cincinnati Children's James M. Anderson Center for Health Systems Excellence and is working on improving predictability of care across the continuum for our pediatric patients. Outside of work, Dr. Mendoza’s family comes first — whether it's spending time exploring the Charlottesville outdoors, visiting relatives in Virginia Beach or travelling abroad. She and her husband love entertaining and hosting and building their local and global community.