The McLeod Family Medicine Residency Program and the new Florence Internal Medicine Residency Program welcomed 29 new Residents to its program on July 1.

The new Residents for the Class of 2029 include: Dr. Smriti Aulakh (not pictured), Dr. John Buford, Dr. Hansel Haase, Dr. Danni Hix, Dr. Lokesh Katiki, Dr. Thomas Le, Dr. Sarah Parker, Dr. Oorja Verma, and Dr. Steele Willoughby who are joining the McLeod Family Medicine program in Florence.

Joining the McLeod Rural Residency program in Cheraw are: Dr. Deekshitha Chandrasekhar, Dr. Angela Emanuel, and

Dr. Darran Khublall. New Residents joining the Rural Residency program in Clarendon are: Dr. Adebola Bamidele, Dr. Dhiraj Bhambhani, Dr. Jagat Daliya, and Dr. Sandeep Guntuku.

New Residents joining the Florence Internal Medicine Residency program are: Dr. Courtney Brown, Dr. Abdelrahman Elsayed, Dr. Emad Khosh Hemmat, Dr. FNU Jyotsna, Dr. Poshitha Kondadasula, Dr. Muhammad Imran Malik (not pictured), Dr. Kylie Parrish, Dr. Sarah Patterson, Dr. Ananya Prakash, Dr. Colby Purvis, Dr. Maleesha Thammitage, Dr. Raghu Vamsi Vanguru (not pictured), and Dr. Jarvis Vaughn.

The McLeod Family Medicine Residency Program is designed to train physicians in an effort to increase the availability of family medicine physicians for patients in the 18-county region McLeod Health serves. After graduating from medical school, physicians who join McLeod for their residency receive a rigorous three years of training to prepare for their own future practice. The McLeod Family Medicine Residency Program began in 1979 and the McLeod Family Medicine Rural Residency Program was established in 2020. From the two programs, more than 50 percent of the physicians have stayed to care for patients in South Carolina and the McLeod Health service area of Northeastern South Carolina and Southeastern North Carolina.

The McLeod Internal Medicine Residency program welcomed its first class of thirteen first- and second-year residents on July 1, 2026. The program will provide three years of clinical training in primary care, hospital medicine and subspecialty fellowship.