The College of Community Health Sciences has filled the first class of its new UA Tuscaloosa Psychiatry Residency Program. Six medical school graduates matched with the program in March.
The Tuscaloosa Psychiatry Residency, launched and accredited in 2025, is a four-year education and training program for medical school graduates that will prepare them to become board-eligible in the field of psychiatry.
The residency provides opportunities for psychiatry residents to learn and work alongside highly skilled and experienced medical professionals in a wide range of inpatient and outpatient practice settings, including urban medical centers and smaller and rural community sites.
Psychiatry residents will work at DCH Regional Medical Center in Tuscaloosa, on the hospital’s inpatient unit, in the psychiatric emergency room and will handle psychiatric consultations. DCH is the region’s advanced trauma center.
Residents will also work in community mental health at Indian Rivers Behavioral Health in Tuscaloosa and in community mental health and rural psychiatry at Project Horseshoe Farm in Greensboro, Ala. In addition, residents will have addiction psychiatry rotations at Bradford Health Service’s rehabilitation unit in Warrior, Ala., and they will work with physicians at University Medical Center and the UA Student Health Center and Pharmacy, both of which are operated by the College. UMC, the largest multi-specialty community practice in West Alabama, serves as the foundation of the College’s clinical teaching program for its medical students and family medicine residents.
“I am thrilled to get started as we expand and improve mental health care across West Alabama,” said Dr. Jamie Reeves, director of the psychiatry residency. “Thank you to everyone who has spent the last several years working hard to establish our program and recruit six outstanding residents who will lead the way.”
The residency Class of 2030 and where they completed medical school:
Priyenka Khatiwada, MD: Virgina Tech Carilion School of Medicine, Roanoke, Va.
Christopher Lane, MD: Mercer University School of Medicine, Macon, Ga.
Mary Parkes, DO: Edward Via University (Virginia College of Osteopathic Medicine-Auburn), Auburn, Ala.
Kartik Reddy, MD: McGovern Medical School at the University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston, Texas
Haris Rehman, DO: Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine, Bradenton Campus, Bradenton, Fla.
Jacob Thomas, MD: McGovern Medical School at the University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston, Texas