HMC Matched with New Residents

The Hilo Medical Center’s Hawai’i Island Family Medicine Residency Program is set to receive its second class of residents from the National Resident Matching Program. The program is part of the Hawai’i Health Systems Corporation’s aim to train and retain primary care providers through its two year Primary Care Training Program.

Hawai’i’s newest PCTP residents will be Will Chapple, MD, Tuy-Ngoc “Unity” Nguyen, MD, Karen Rayos, MD, and Gaku Yamaguchi, MD.

“We welcome the second class of residents into our ohana,” said Dan Brinkman, Interim East Hawai’i Regional CEO of HHSC. “We look forward to the opportunity to provide them with the best possible training experience.”

During its first year, the PCTP received 138 application for four Residency Program positions. In its second year, the program received 560 applications.

“This group of residents really represents our Pacific Rim culture here in Hawai’i,” said Dr. Kristine McCoy, Hawai’i Island Family Medicine Residency Program Director. “Together we will be reaching out to a broad swath of our community and building the platform for better health here in East Hawai’i and across the state.”

The number of residents in training will grow to eight with the addition of the new members. They will join the inaugural class of residents: Hamed Ahmadinia, MD, Kaohimanu Dang Akiona, MD, Svetlana Shchedrina, MD, and Seren Tokumura. MD.

As part of one of the most dynamic three-year training programs in the country, the physicians will be integrated among fellow learners from the University of Hawai’i at Hilo Daniel K. Inouye College of Pharmacy, the University of Hawai’i at Hilo’s School of Nursing, The University of Hawai’i at Manoa’s School of Nursing and Dental Hygiene, and I Ola Lahui, a behavioral health training program that specializes in rural communities.

A report by the “Hawai’i Physician Workforce Assessment Project” estimated that in a best case scenario, the state will be short 800 physicians in 2020. Two-hundred of those doctors will be needed on the Big Island.

More information on the HIFMR Program can be found by visiting the program’s website.