St. Rose Dominican Welcomes Inaugural Class of Medical Residents

Diverse group from around the globe comprise first class of 12 doctors-in-training 

LAS VEGAS, March 20, 2023 – Dignity Health-St. Rose Dominican recently announced that twelve medical school graduates matched with our hospitals and will become our first-ever class of medical Residents. With the new St. Rose Dominican Graduate Medical Education Program, these doctors-in-training will take the next step in their careers and spend the three years of their medical training under our staff’s supervision. 

Match Day is well known in the graduate medical education community as it is the day on which the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP) releases the eagerly awaited results of all the applicants who have applied for residency or fellowship training positions in the U.S. It is an important day for medical students. Securing a residency position is pivotal in securing one's future career and can be a deciding factor in getting a medical license. 

Match Day occurs on the third Friday of March each year and is marked with ceremonies at many of the 155 medical schools in the United States where those results are announced. At precisely 9:00 a.m. Pacific Time, medical students across the nation simultaneously learn where they matched. 

The inaugural class: The twelve students who make up the new Dignity Health-St. Rose Dominican Graduate Medical Education Program are:

• Khalid Al-rayess - San Francisco, CA
• Alexis Baricevic - Rolling Hills Estates, CA
• Matthew Barrera - Redlands, CA
• Christine Huynh - Renton, WA
• Ameer Khalek - Las Vegas, NV
• Shazia Pathan - Los Angeles, CA
• Tha Sok - Alhambra, CA
• Jisang Yu - Yeongwol, South Korea
• Okanlawon Abu - Lagos, Nigeria
• Farah Issa - Cairo, Egypt
• Olivia O’Keefe - Las Vegas, NV
• Joanne Uy - Cebu City, Philippines

Dr. Kimberly Bates, Director of the Internal Medicine Residency Program, and the St. Rose Dominican GME team have been preparing for this day for months. They are excited to launch the much-anticipated program and look forward to the June arrival of their new charges.  

“We are incredibly eager to get started,” said Dr. Bates. “The Residency program truly fulfills the mission of our hospital and that mission will be an integral element of our approach in what we teach.” 

Primary Care: Within the Internal Medicine Program, four Residents will follow a Primary Care track, emphasizing an area of particular need in southern Nevada. 

“The number one key indicator of healthy communities is the number of primary care physicians in that community.” said Dr. Bates. “The entire job of a Primary Care physician is to manage a person’s health for life. To have the ability to see a patient, diagnose, and treat them before something requires more advanced care. I am excited to see young doctors ready to embody that mission, embracing the challenge and commitment.”

Residents will perform their clinic hours in medical offices in the North Las Vegas Neighborhood Hospital Campus and their Hospital hours at the San Martin Campus. 

Improving health care in Nevada: Residencies are an important element in improving health care in Nevada, as they correlate closely with the likelihood that doctors will stay in-state. Roughly 40 percent of medical students return to Nevada if they graduate in-state, then perform an out-of-state Residency. Among those who graduate and complete a Residency program in Nevada, nearly 75 percent tend to stay and practice in Nevada. 

This year’s inaugural class of 12 Internal Medicine Residents will be followed each year by 12 more Residents each year. 

Just the beginning: Next year, St. Rose will launch a second Residency Program with eight students in a Family Medicine Program. 

“This is the beginning of something very special for both our hospitals and our community,” said Dr. Rod Buzzas, Chief Medical Officer for Siena and St. Rose de Lima Hospitals and Designated Institutional Officer for the GME Program. “As St. Rose hospitals enter the world of teaching hospitals, we further extend the benefit we bring to our community by educating new physicians and attracting them to stay and practice as doctors here in southern Nevada.” 

Dig Deeper: How does Match Day Work?

In the United States, senior medical student applicants and residency programs that register with the NRMP participate in a process known as "the Match." 

• Applicants begin the application process in the summer, programs review applications, and invite selected candidates for interviews held between October and February. 
• Following the interview period, applicants submit to the NRMP a "rank-order list" of programs where they wish to train. 
• Similarly, residency programs submit a rank order list of applicants they prefer to train. 
• The process is blinded so neither applicants nor programs see each other's rank order lists. 
• The two rank order lists are then processed by the NRMP's matching algorithm.
• On the Monday prior to Match Day applicants are informed if they matched, but not where. 
• Applicants who match to a training position must wait until the Match Day on Friday to learn the location of their position.

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About Dignity Health-St. Rose Dominican

Dignity Health-St. Rose Dominican recently celebrated 75 years in southern Nevada, marking the anniversary of the arrival of the seven Adrian Dominican Sisters who founded Rose de Lima Hospital on June 27, 1947. As Nevada’s only not-for-profit, faith-based health system, St. Rose Dominican is still guided by the vision and core values of the Adrian Dominican Sisters in all its endeavors. As the Henderson and Las Vegas communities grow, the St. Rose Dominican health system and its nearly 4,000 employees continue the Sisters’ mission of serving people in need. Dignity Health currently operates three acute care hospitals in southern Nevada and is a member of the multi-state Dignity Health network of nearly 10,000 physicians, 60,000 employees, 41 acute care hospitals, and 400-plus care centers, including hospitals, urgent and occupational care, imaging centers, and primary care clinics. For more information, visit our website at www.strosehospitals.org.