New Clinical Residents Welcomed to Purdue Veterinary Medicine

VCS Department personnel gathered to meet the new VCS residents at a welcome breakfast held in the Brunner Small Animal Hospital July 16 (Photo by Andres Herrera)
VCS Department personnel gathered to meet the new VCS residents at a welcome breakfast held in the Brunner Small Animal Hospital July 16 (Photo by Andres Herrera)
August 1, 2025

As the calendar pages turn toward the latter part of summer, it’s time to welcome a new class of residents to the Purdue University College of Veterinary Medicine. On July 16, the Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences (VCS) held a welcome breakfast for the new VCS residents in the Joy Matson Multi-purpose Room of the Brunner Small Animal Hospital. Many department faculty and current residents joined in the event to help welcome the new residents while also enjoying some coffee and treats.

The Interim VCS Department Head, Dr. Tim Lescun, began the event by sharing opening remarks before each of the new residents were introduced by their mentor. The breakfast provided the new residents with a nice break from their busy orientation schedule while also giving others the opportunity to welcome them to PVM!

The three year residency programs provide advanced training in a chosen specialty and preparation for obtaining board certification as specialists. Residencies also offer research and teaching opportunities.

Congratulations to each of these veterinarians who’ve joined the VCS Department for their advanced clinical training:

The new class of VCS residents for 2025-2026: Front Row (L-R) – Niloufar Ghahari, Catarina Bianchi, Madeleine Swindell, Polina Zinchenko, Kristy Faulkner and Nikole Pouri; Second Row (L-R) – Stephanie Smick, Kiki Landsbergen, Courtney Westcott, Pili Ortiz-Fullana, Sofia Dazarola (a clinical pathology intern with the Comparative Pathobiology Department who participated in the VCS resident orientation), Jennifer Tsai, Anna Preston, Amanda Midkiff, and Rachael Lahar (Photo by Ed Lausch)

Dr. Catarina Bianchi – Small Animal Surgery (earned a DVM degree from the University of California, Davis in 2024 and did a Small Animal Medicine and Surgery Internship at the University of Florida from 2024-2025)

Dr. Kristy Faulkner – Neurology Specialty Intern (earned a DVM degree from the Atlantic Veterinary College, Prince Edward Island, in 2024 and did a Small Animal Rotating Internship at Canada West Veterinary Specialists & Critical Care from 2024-2025)

Dr. Niloufar Ghahari – Small Animal Medicine Specialty Intern (earned a DVM degree from Semnan University, Iran, in 2018; did a Small Animal Internal Medicine Residency at the University of Tehran, Iran, from 2018-2021; and served as a Purdue University Visiting Scholar from 2022-2023 and graduate student from 2023-2025)

Dr. Rachael Lahar – Small Animal Internal Medicine (earned a DVM degree from the University of Illinois in 2024 and did a Small Animal Rotating Internship at North Carolina State University from 2024-2025)

Dr. Kiki Landsbergen – Large Animal Surgery (earned a DVM degree from the University of Calgary in 2024 and served as an intern veterinarian at Moore Equine Veterinary Centre, Canada from 2024-2025)

Dr. Amanda Midkiff – Oncology (earned a DVM degree from The Ohio State University in 2024 and did a Small Animal Rotating Internship at Ohio State from 2024-2025)

Dr. Pili Ortiz-Fullana – Ophthalmology (earned a DVM degree from North Carolina State University in 2023; did a Small Animal Rotating Internship at Ohio State from 2023-2024; and, from 2024-2025, completed an Ophthalmology Specialty Internship at Animal Eye Guys and served as an associate veterinarian at LowCost Pet Vax)

Dr. Nikole Pouri – Oncology (earned a DVM degree from Western University in 2024 and did a Rotating Internship at VCA Animal Specialty Group, Los Angeles, California, from 2024-2025)

Dr. Anna Preston – Diagnostic Imaging (earned a DVM degree from the University of Melbourne in 2022; served as a volunteer veterinarian at SPCA, Fiji and as a volunteer veterinarian at Te Are Manu Veterinary Clinic, Cook Islands in 2023; worked as an associate veterinarian at Albavet Dunfermline, Scotland from 2023-2024; and was a Junior Clinical Training Scholar in Small Animal Studies at the University of Cambridge from 2024-2025)

Dr. Stephanie Smick – Large Animal Internal Medicine (earned a DVM degree from St. George’s University in 2024 and did a Large Animal Rotating Internship at Purdue University from 2024-2025)

Dr. Madeleine Swindell – Small Animal Internal Medicine (earned a DVM degree from Texas A&M University in 2024 and did a Small Animal Medicine and Surgery Internship at Purdue University from 2024-2025)

Dr. Jennifer Tsai – Emergency & Critical Care (earned a DVM degree from Iowa State University in 2024 and did a Small Animal Rotating Internship at MedVet Chicago from 2024-2025)

Dr. Courtney Westcott – Cardiology Specialty Intern (earned a DVM degree from the University of Georgia in 2024 and did a Small Animal Medicine and Surgery Internship at Purdue University from 2024-2025)

Dr. Polina Zinchenko – Neurology (earned a DVM degree from the University of Georgia in 2023; did a Small Animal Rotating Internship at Purdue University from 2023-2024; and completed a Neurology Specialty Internship at Blue Pearl Pet Hospital Stone Oak, San Antonio, Texas, from 2024-2025)

New VCS residents received a warm welcome from department faculty and current residents. (Photo by Andres Herrera)
New VCS residents received a warm welcome from department faculty and current residents. (Photo by Andres Herrera)

In addition to the VCS Department residents, a new class of clinical pathology and anatomic pathology residents joined the College of Veterinary Medicine this summer and will be featured in a separate story in an upcoming issue of the Vet Gazette.

Writer(s): Kevin Doerr | pvmnews@purdue.edu

Recent Stories

“Paws Up” – brought to you by the PVM Wellness Committee

This week, we are proud to recognize Lorraine Fox, who is a business assistant with the Veterinary Medicine Procurement Center.

PVM Interview Days Move College Closer to Admitting the DVM Class of 2030

After a total of three afternoons dedicated to conducting in-person interviews with 226 prospective veterinary students, the Purdue University College of Veterinary Medicine is close to completing the process of admitting 84 members of the incoming first-year DVM class – the Class of 2030.  The students invited for the interview days were selected from a total pool of 1,930 applicants from across the country as well as countries abroad.

Experts to Gather at Purdue for Conference Addressing the Public Health Threat of Antimicrobial Resistance

The ongoing challenges posed by multi-drug resistant infections will be the focus of a multidisciplinary conference taking place in three weeks at Purdue University.  The Fourth Annual Conference on Antimicrobial Resistance is set for February 25–26, 2026 at Purdue’s Stewart Center in West Lafayette. Registration is still open for the event, which will bring together scientists and scholars from human and veterinary medicine, public health, research, and industry to address the determinants, dynamics and deterrence of drug resistance.

PVM’s Upcoming Coppoc One Health Lecture to Focus on Dogs as Sentinels of Environmental Exposure

The Purdue University College of Veterinary Medicine brings a leading One Health scholar to campus each year to address vital health issues from a One Health perspective as part of the Coppoc One Health Lecture series.  This year’s presentation, scheduled for February 26 in Lynn Hall Room 2026, is on the engaging topic, “One Health at Home: Dogs as Sentinels of Environmental Exposure.” The speaker will be Audrey Ruple, DVM, MS, PhD, DACVPM, MRCVS, the Dorothy A. and Richard G. Metcalf Professor of Veterinary Medical Informatics at the Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine at Virginia Tech.

“Paws Up” – brought to you by the PVM Wellness Committee

Today we are happy to acknowledge our Student Success Center Team.

One Health: A ‘digital twin’ model for predicting cancer outcomes

The striking similarities between invasive bladder cancer in dogs and humans have fueled research advances for more than three decades. Most of that work has looked at separate aspects of the disease — risk factors, early detection, symptoms, treatment and gene expression. But a new project at Purdue University that combines many types of available data in a “digital twin” model of bladder cancer may prove powerful enough to predict patient outcomes, starting with the probability of metastasis.

Purdue Professor Emeritus Bill Blevins Wins Lifetime Achievement Award at ACVR Annual Meeting

The American College of Veterinary Radiology (ACVR) gave its esteemed Lifetime Achievement Award for 2024 to Purdue Professor Emeritus Bill Blevins, who is well known to countless Purdue Veterinary Medicine alumni for the expertise he taught them about all things Diagnostic Imaging during his long Purdue career.