PCOM Georgia Students Celebrate Match Day
March 25, 2019
Fourth year osteopathic medicine students rejoiced with friends and family as they
learned their residency program matches.
It was a reunion of sorts as about 80 fourth year PCOM Georgia osteopathic medicine students, some with significant others, gathered at the SweetWater Brewing Company
in Atlanta on Saturday, March 16, 2019. They took a moment to celebrate and share
their news with each other after finding out where they will spend their next three
to five years completing residency programs in their selected specialties.
Friday was the National Resident Matching Program’s Match Day, although some students
had participated in earlier programs such as the Military Match and the American Osteopathic
Association Intern/Resident Registration Program. Pharmacy students at PCOM Georgia who desire to complete a residency will participate in the ASHP Resident
Matching Program and will receive their results on April 10.
Jordan Moss (DO ’19) who matched at Floyd Medical Center in Rome, Georgia, was ecstatic.
“I’m very excited. I’ve been there the last couple of years for my rotations. I already
feel like part of the family and I’m excited to stay!” she said.
Shannon Philipps (DO ’19), who will move on to a neurology residency at the Medical
College of Georgia at Augusta University after graduating in May described the sensation.
“I feel like the weight that has been sitting on my chest for four years is gone.
It’s an indescribable feeling.”
Kaitlyn Banning (DO ’19) agreed. “It’s like a massive ton of bricks has just been
lifted off your back.” She is looking forward to completing an OB/GYN residency at
Detroit Medical Center in Michigan. “I’m super thrilled. It was a really good option
for me.”
She explained that she participated in a couples match with Jeffrey Aguiar (DO ’19),
her significant other, who matched to a general surgery residency at Henry Ford Macomb
Hospital near Detroit. “I found love and a medical career at PCOM Georgia,” she said
smiling, noting that her parents moved to Cincinnati, Ohio, from Georgia and she’ll
be within a four hour drive of them.
Banning shared her thoughts on the last four years. She explained, “You apply to medical
school thinking that the MCAT is the hardest test you’ll ever take and you’re like,
shoot yeah, I’m over that hump. I’m good to go. And then you get into medical school
and you see Step 1 looming in the future and you’re like the MCAT has nothing on this
exam. And then you take Step 1 and well, there’s Step 2, and then you take Step 2
and you’re like, I have to get into a residency and do all these interviews. I think
that’s kind of a nice analogy for life. There’s always a harder next step. It really
never ends, but we chose this and it’s a lifelong educational path.”
She added, “Our time at PCOM Georgia has gone by so fast in a broad, look-back-at-the-whole-experience
kind of way. But each year was really challenging and hard in its own way. You’re
so busy, you’re not even thinking about time. You’re just thinking day to day. You’re
so entrenched in it that, looking back, it did fly by.”
Although some students will be traveling many miles to reach their residency sites,
Georgia Tech graduate Nida Jiwani is staying close to home. She matched in family
medicine at Gwinnett Medical Center in Lawrenceville, Georgia. “I’m super excited
to start there,” she said. I’ve grown up in Gwinnett County so it will be nice to
serve my community once again.”
Besides congratulatory hugs and high fives, the celebration, hosted by Institutional
Advancement, also featured “I Matched” t-shirts, a photo booth and Fox Bros Bar-B-Q.
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About PCOM Georgia
Established in 2005, PCOM Georgia is a private, not-for-profit, accredited institute of higher education dedicated
to the healthcare professions. The Suwanee, Georgia, campus is affiliated with Philadelphia
College of Osteopathic Medicine, a premier osteopathic medical school with a storied
history. PCOM Georgia offers doctoral degrees in osteopathic medicine, pharmacy, and
physical therapy and graduate degrees in biomedical sciences, medical laboratory science,
and physician assistant studies. Emphasizing "a whole person approach to care," PCOM
Georgia focuses on educational excellence, interprofessional education and service
to the wider community. For more information, visit pcom.edu/georgia or call 678-225-7500. The campus is also home to the Georgia Osteopathic Care Center,
an osteopathic manipulative medicine clinic, which is open to the public by appointment.
For more information, visit pcomgeorgiahealth.org.
For more information, contact:
Barbara Myers
Senior Public Relations Manager
Email: BarbaraMy@pcom.edu
Office: 678-225-7532 | Cell:
770-309-0613
Connect with PCOM Georgia