Roger Williams Celebrates 53rd Residency Class
On June 16, the Internal Medicine Residency Program at Roger Williams Medical Center celebrated its 53rd graduating class at the Crown Plaza in Warwick.
Dr. John Miskovsky, Director of the Internal Medicine Residency Program, noted the remarkable challenges that this year’s graduating class faced during their three years of training while offering congratulations on their accomplishments.
“It has been an incredible three years since our graduates began their training at Roger Williams. In June 2020, graduates of this program celebrated the completion of their residency during a lunch meeting in Kay auditorium in the basement of the hospital, distancing and wearing masks. COVID-19 was rampant, the hospital was consistently at or above capacity, as was the intensive care unit, and elective outpatient rotations and in-person clinic visits were memories from the past. Graduates were unable to share the event with their friends. Thankfully, that time has largely passed. To the graduates, I cannot overstate how incredibly proud I am of each of you. Your performance over the past three years has been an example to everyone.”
This year’s graduates recognized during the ceremony included Giulio Ciprian, MD, (pursuing hospital medicine as a respiratory ICU and ICU hospitalist at Lifespan in Providence, RI), Catherine Ekladios, MD, (pursuing an endocrine fellowship at Scripps Clinic in La Jolla, CA), Ahmed Eldib, MD, (pursuing a rheumatology fellowship at Larkin Community Hospital in Miami, FL), Afsana Jahan, MD, (pursuing primary care at Coastal Medical in Providence, RI), Ravinder Kaler, MD, (pursuing geriatric medicine fellowship at Roger Williams), Jessica Khoury, MD, (pursuing endocrinology fellowship at George Washington University Hospital in Washington, DC), Navya Kirla, MD, (pursuing hospital medicine at Our Lady of Fatima Hospital), Georgio Medawar, MD, (pursing hematology/oncology fellowship at Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, SC), Abdallah Mohamed, MD, (pursing hospital medicine at East Tennessee State University in Johnson City, TN), Cassondra Paletta, MD, (pursuing clinical pharmacology and toxicology fellowship at Western University in Ontario, Canada), Priya Patel, MD, (pursuing nephrology fellowship at George Washington University Hospital in Washington, DC), Antoine Salloum, MD, (pursuing internal medicine/dermatology practice at Aspire Dermatology in Middletown, RI), Rabya Saraf, MD, (pursuing cardiology fellowship at St. Louis University Hospital in St. Louis, MS), Neenu Sukumaran, MD, (pursuing rheumatology fellowship at Hartford Hospital/UConn Health, Hartford and Framington, CT), Marko Tkach, DO, (pursuing endocrinology fellowship at HCA Bayonet Point/University of South Florida in Hudson, FL), and Yana Turkowski, MD, (pursuing primary care at the VA Medical Center in Boston, MA).
Dr. Miskovsky also recognized Drs. Ekladios, Khoury, and Saraf for their efforts as assistant chief residents this academic year and presented a certificate for outstanding service to graduating chief resident Adderly Toribio de Jesus, MD, (pursuing hepatology fellowship at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, MA.).
Dr. Toribio then presented resident-selected awards for categorical intern of the year to Maarij Siddiqi, DO, preliminary intern of the year to Benjamin Capuano, MD, resident of the year to Catherine Ekladios, MD, attending of the year to John Miskovsky, MD, consultant of the year to Edward Medeiros, DO, and an award for special recognition for teaching efforts to Joseph Sweeney, MD.
“As I have stated many times, the Rog residency is a family, and while this family has experienced a (hopefully) once in a generation, if not lifetime, stress, you have all risen to the occasion and made me and all of your supervisors and colleagues proud,” Miskovsky said in his concluding remarks.
Dr. John Stoukides, Chairman of the Department of Medicine also commented, “I want to thank Dr. Miskovsky, the program faculty, and the nursing staff for helping to consistently turn out an incredibly competent and knowledgeable graduating class. It really takes a village to train the next generation of physicians and it is clear that Roger Williams has continued to excel at this task.”