Two CHI Employees Match With Residency Programs

Two Community Health of South Florida employees will begin physician residency training in June after matching with the Brodes H. Hartley, Jr. Teaching Health Center.

Dr. Gregory Fignole, a nurse practitioner at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Clinica Campesina Health Center, and Dr. Ia Bezhanidze, a medical assistant at the Key West Health Center, will train at the Doris Ison Health Center alongside eight other incoming residents.

Fignole joined CHI in 2015 after his mother died from cervical cancer at age 37. "What pushed me to become a doctor was seeing her pass early," he said. "This is something that could have been prevented. I want to help people in their lives and educate them."

Bezhanidze, who joined CHI in 2024, grew up in rural Georgia with limited medical access. She will pursue a three-year family medicine residency. "Since my childhood, I wanted to be a physician," she said. "I grew up in a rural area where people do not have the opportunity to go to the doctor."

Bezhanidze trained under Dr. Sandy Santiago, associate medical director for CHI centers in the Florida Keys. Santiago supervises three employees now pursuing residency programs.

The Teaching Health Center matched 10 residents total in family medicine and psychiatry during this year's Match Day.