*RUSM has a first-time residency attainment rate of 96%, calculated as the percent of students attaining a 2025-26 residency position out of graduates or expected graduates in 2024-25 who were active applicants in the 2025 NRMP match or who attained a residency position outside the NRMP match. AUC’s first-time residency attainment rate for 2024-2025 graduates and expected graduates is 95%. SABA’s four-year residency placement rate of 97% is calculated as the percent of students attaining a residency position out of all graduates or expected graduates in 2020-21, 2021-22, 2022-23 and 2023-24 who were active applicants in the NRMP match or attained a residency outside the NRMP match. As of July 17, 2025, they have not published their 2025 rates. SGU’s US residency placement rate of 94% pertains to graduates over five years from 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025 with the rate calculated as the total number of students/graduates who obtained a US residency divided by the total number of students/graduates who applied to a US residency program in a given year as of April 2025.
Two weeks into his first semester of medical school at Ross, Sai Vedati, MD ’21 found himself clutching nothing but a backpack and passport as Hurricane Maria roared across Dominica in September of 2017. “It still is the craziest part of my story,” he says of his action-packed journey to a medical career. With the island in chaos that night, the father of a friend on campus arranged a private speedboat that cut through hurricane wreckage to evacuate students. For Dr. Vedati, it was not merely an escape from disaster, but the start of what he calls a "fever dream" path to becoming a psychiatrist and recipient of the Ross Early Distinguished Career Award. The journey would take him across countries, through natural disasters and a global pandemic, to finally realize his calling.
Dr. Vedati grew up in Baltimore, the child of computer engineers, and is the first physician in his family. "I've always been an extrovert," he says. "I didn't want a career behind the screen of a computer." He attended the University of Maryland, volunteered at Maryland-area hospitals and served as a resident assistant — experiences that confirmed medicine and helping people were his calling.
When Hurricane Maria destroyed the campus in Dominica, Ross University established alternatives. Dr. Vedati and his classmates completed a semester on an Italian ferry docked in St. Kitts. He and three other students shared a room so small that only two could stand at any one time. “It was bizarre,” Dr. Vedati laughs. “But those three guys are all like brothers to me now. We even chose to keep living together when other rooms opened later.” The ferry semester was followed by a final island term in Barbados. Dr. Vedati views those challenges as formative. "At 22, it felt overwhelming. But those experiences gave me perspective and made me more adaptable for what was to come."
Back in Maryland for his clinicals, Dr. Vedati finally felt he was working toward his long-term goal of returning to his community to serve patients. The COVID-19 pandemic interrupted clinicals, but he soon matched into a psychiatry residency in Detroit, MI. This three-year program helped him realize his passion for child psychiatry. Today he is completing a fellowship at the University of Maryland's Shepard Pratt Hospital in the city where his dream of medicine began.
Dr. Vedati is now charting a clear future. “My goal is to work in community psychiatry and academia. I’d love to become a program director one day, teaching medical students and residents.” He adds that the aspiration to teach comes from lived experience. “I didn’t get to make a lot of choices early on. For the first time, I’m in a position to make decisions about my career, and that’s exciting.”
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