Share
On Friday, March 21, cheers erupted in the Loyola Center for Fitness as fourth-year medical students at the Stritch School of Medicine tore open envelopes containing letters that would change their lives.
As maroon and gold balloons fell from the rafters, classmates, family members, and friends embraced, clinked champagne flutes, wept, and quite literally, jumped for joy. Striding across the gym floor or pressed together around high-top tables draped in black tablecloths, 174 Loyola University Chicago students and their guests experienced the emotional whirlwind of Match Day, an annual rite of passage in which medical school students learn where they will continue their training as paid residents.
When Sullibet Ramirez (BS ’19, MD ’25) ripped open her sealed envelope, her knees shook and tears welled up in her eyes. Born in Mexico City, she had been matched at Denver Health—her first choice—where she will specialize in emergency medicine.
“I’m so excited,” she says. “I love the mission of bringing medicine to people on the street, providing the first point to care for the patient and then knowing where to direct them. There’s never a boring day.”
Ramirez, who worked as an EMT as an undergraduate at Loyola, adds that she is elated for the chance “to speak to patients in my native language [Spanish], people who have never seen a doctor.”
Standing by her side, her father, Jesus Ramirez, a construction worker in Chicago, crinkled up the edges of his mustache, smiling. “She’s the first doctor in the family,” he says.
You're not only physicians, but agents of healing in a world that desperately needs your care and your leadership.
— Douglas W. Woods, provost and chief academic officer of Loyola University Chicago
In the largest residency match in the National Resident Matching Program’s 73-year history, the Stritch Class of 2025 joined a total of 52,489 applicants across the U.S. competing for 43,237 positions, a roughly 4% increase in residency openings from 2024. The NRMP uses a computerized algorithm to match applicants’ preferences with those of residency program directors.
Prior to the envelope opening, James Mendez, senior associate dean of Student Affairs, announced the matching statistics for the Stritch Class of 2025. All told, Loyola fourth-year medical students matched in 24 specialties across 28 states: primary care (40%) and within primary care, family medicine, pediatrics, med/peds, internal medicine, and preliminary medicine; anesthesiology (6%); emergency medicine (9%); preliminary surgery (5%); orthopedics (4%); dermatology; obstetrics-gynecology; and psychiatry.
Shouts rang through the gymnasium as Mendez said that 67% of the matching students were women.
The program included welcoming remarks from 2025 class presidents Samantha Swamy (MD ’25) and Jimmy Zhou (MD ’25), an opening prayer from Health Sciences Campus Ministry Director Ann Hillman, and remarks from Douglas W. Woods, provost and chief academic officer of Loyola University Chicago, and Sam J. Marzo (MD ’91), dean of the Stritch School of Medicine. Theresa Kristopaitis, associate dean for Curriculum Integration and a professor of internal medicine, received the Outstanding Medical Educator award; and Margaret Zhi-Yin Tsien, an associate professor of internal medicine and pediatrics, was recognized with the Outstanding Clinical Educator award.
“As you take the next steps in your career, remember that the world needs your wisdom, your compassion, and your courage more than ever,” Woods told the audience. “You’re not only physicians, but agents of healing in a world that desperately needs your care and your leadership.”
Standing beside her first-generation Indian immigrant parents, Pravani Chamarthi (MD ’25), opened her envelope to discover she was accepted into a pediatric residency at UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland. It was the realization of a lifetime dream, and a chance to return to California where she grew up and her parents still reside.
“I knew that I really wanted to go back home to be with my family, and it really does mean a lot to them since I’m the first health care professional in the family. I love working with children, especially being someone who comes from a very large family,” she says. “I have a very natural maternal instinct.”
Bennett Dwan (MD ’25), who grew up in Michigan, was joined by his wife, Elizabeth Dwan. She cradled their 1-year-old son, Judah, whose ears were encased in pale-blue sound dampening headphones. Matched in a family medicine residency program at Corewell Health in Troy, Michigan, just outside Detroit, Dwan was eager to continue his training and resettle near his hometown, where his extended family would be able to offer support caring for their son.
“Everyone talks about how time slows down, and I really felt like time slowed down. I almost forgot how to read,” he says. As the world restored into view, he felt “pure excitement and gratitude.”
“I’m so very excited to be in a program I feel will train me well, and also be close to family and friends,” Dwan says.
