Pasadena Medical School Posts Perfect Residency Match Rate for Third Straight Year

Every member of the Class of 2026 at the Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine secured a first-year residency position, the Pasadena-based school announced Friday, extending its perfect match rate to three consecutive years.

The school said all of its graduating students were placed through the National Resident Matching Program, which uses an algorithm to assign medical school graduates to residency programs based on ranked preferences. Students and supporters gathered at the Pasadena Convention Center on Friday morning to celebrate the results, which were released simultaneously to applicants across the country at 9 a.m. PDT.

The milestone marks a continued benchmark for the school, which opened in 2020 and graduated its first class in 2024. Each of the three graduating classes has achieved a 100% placement rate for first-year residency positions, according to the school.

Among the Class of 2026, 54% matched into programs within California, the school said. The institutions with the most placements were UC Irvine Medical Center, Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center, and Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. Internal Medicine, Psychiatry, and Emergency Medicine were the most common specialties, and 36% of graduates matched into primary care fields including Family Medicine, Internal Medicine, and Pediatrics. Fourteen percent will continue their training within Kaiser Permanente’s own residency programs, according to the announcement.

“Today, we are incredibly proud to celebrate the residency matches of our third class of students, the remarkable Class of 2026,” John L. Dalrymple, KPSOM dean and chief executive officer, said in a statement. “This milestone reflects the years of hard work, resilience, and commitment each student has invested in their journey to becoming a physician.”

For several graduates, that journey was shaped by personal adversity. Barune Thapa, who matched into Internal Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, said his father’s death from cardiac arrest at age 49—when Thapa was 16—set him on his path.

“Losing my dad is what led me to medicine, and specifically the intersection of global health equity and cardiometabolic health,” Thapa said in a statement released by the school. “That I now have a job as a doctor, that I get to care for people and work to prevent deaths like his, it would have meant the world to him. It is the greatest honor of my life to get to do that.”

Thapa said he plans to pursue a Cardiology fellowship after completing his residency.

Dalja Parks, a first-generation student and cancer survivor who the school said spent as much time in hospital gowns as she did in a white coat during her medical training, matched into Internal Medicine at UC San Diego Medical Center.

Alexa Reilly matched into the Obstetrics and Gynecology program at Virginia Commonwealth University Health System. Reilly said her interest in the specialty grew from her own experiences as a patient.

“I wanted to advocate for patients like me,” Reilly said. “I kept an open mind. I shadowed and did elective rotations in a variety of other specialties to make sure that [this specialty] was truly the right path for me, and it is!”

Joanne Li, who matched into Ophthalmology at SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University, learned of her placement early—a feature of the Ophthalmology and Urology matching process. She said she is looking forward to returning to New York City.

The school, located at 98 S. Los Robles Ave. in Pasadena, was founded in 2020 and is named after Bernard J. Tyson, the former Kaiser Permanente chairman and chief executive officer. Its curriculum is built on three pillars: Biomedical Science, Clinical Science, and Health Systems Science, according to the school. Dalrymple, who previously served as senior associate dean for medical education at Harvard Medical School, became the school’s second dean and chief executive officer in July 2024.

The Class of 2026 will begin their residencies following the school’s May commencement ceremony.

“As we commemorate Match Day, we continue advancing our aim to transform medical education,” Dalrymple said. “We eagerly look forward to the impact this class of students will have on their residency programs and the communities they will serve while championing compassionate, person-centered care.”