In 1923, he founded the with Julio Antonio Mella; his last public appearance was when Mella's ashes were spread. Hernández's son, Eusebio Adolfo Hernández, was a professor of social sciences here. He also participated in the Soviet solidarity movement with his father. In 1926, he became a member of the Cuban Academy of Sciences and French Society of Obstetrics. That year, Hernández self-diagnosed colon cancer and went to Berlin for his successful colostomy. On 23 November 1933, he died in Havana from pulmonary edema. He was veiled in the Cuban Academy of Sciences rather than the due to pressure from President Ramón Grau. He was buried in Colon Cemetery, Havana and was awarded the and the Order of the . On 18 January 2016, his remains were moved to the veterans' area of the cemetery in a ceremony headed by José Ramón Machado Ventura, , Roberto Morales Ojeda, and Eusebio Leal.
