mew

Anybody have an idea of what we should wear to these events?

That's what I'm worried about- are programs still going to be understanding of conflicts now that they know we don't have to travel?

Does anyone know how bad it is if we can't make the pre-interview socials? Some programs I'm applying to have socials the night before. I have some FM interviews in the evenings that will very likely conflict with the socials and can't move the FM interviews without creating more conflicts. Worried this will seriously affect my candidacy for the program.

Anatomical Pathology: Calgary (Feb 3), Ottawa IMG (Feb 2), Queen's IMG (Feb 4), McGill (Feb 8), McMaster (Feb 11), Sherbrooke (Feb 13), Laval (Feb16) Anesthesiology: NOSM (Feb 14), Western (Feb 15), Laval (Feb 15), MUN (Feb 15), Queen's (Feb 15), Montreal (Feb 16), McMaster (Feb 16) Cardiac Surgery: Montreal (Feb 16) Dermatology: Montreal (Feb 15), Sherbrooke (Feb 16), Dalhousie (Feb 16), Laval (Feb 17) Diagnostic Radiology: Western (Feb 14), Dalhousie (Feb 15), Montreal (Feb 15), Calgary (Feb 16), McMaster (Feb 16), Sask (Feb 16), U of A (Feb 16), Laval (Feb 17), McGill (Feb 17), Queens (Feb 17). Emergency Medicine: Laval (Feb 14), Queen's (Feb 15), Calgary (Feb 16), Dalhousie (Feb 16), McGill (Feb 17), Western (Feb 17) Family Medicine: Montreal (Feb 1), Sherbrooke (Feb 1), Laval (Feb 1), Ontario Joint Panel IMG (Feb 4), McGill-Montreal (Feb 15), McGill-Gatineau (Feb 15), UBC (Feb 15), UBC IMG (Feb 15), McGill-Châteauguay (Feb 16), Ottawa (Feb 16), McMaster (Feb 16), Toronto (Feb 16), McGill-Val d'Or (Feb 16), UfA (Edmonton - Red Deer - Grand Prarie IMG) (Feb 16), NOSM (Feb 17), Western (Feb 17), Queen's (Feb 17), Memorial CMG (Feb 17) General Pathology: USask IMG (Feb11), McMaster IMG (Feb 15) General Surgery: Laval (Feb 1), Calgary (Feb 11), McMaster-Niagara (Feb 14), McMaster-Hamilton (Feb 15), Memorial (Feb 15), Montreal (Feb 16), Dalhousie (Feb 17), NOSM (Feb. 17), Manitoba (Feb 17) Hematological Pathology: UBC (Feb 7), Dalhousie (Feb 10), Toronto (Feb 14) Internal Medicine: Montreal (Feb 15) Medical Genetics and Genomics: Calgary (Jan 31), UBC (Feb 2), Ottawa IMG (Feb 9) Toronto (Feb 10), McGill (Feb 16) Medical Microbiology: Calgary (Feb 5), UBC (Feb 8), Manitoba (Feb 9), McMaster (Feb 10) Neurology: Dalhousie (Feb 7), Western (Feb 11), Manitoba (Feb 11), Sherbrooke (Feb 11), Calgary (Feb 14), Queen's (Feb 15), McGill (Feb 17) Neurology - Paediatric: McMaster (Feb 3), UBC (Feb 11), Ottawa (Feb 14) Neuropathology: Toronto (Feb 14) Neurosurgery: Montreal (Jan 31), Dalhousie (Feb 4), Toronto (Feb 8), Ottawa (Feb 10), Laval (Feb 11), UBC (Feb 14), McMaster (Feb 15), Western (Feb 16), Manitoba (Feb 17) Nuclear Medicine: Western (Feb 7), Sherbrooke (Feb 10), McGill (Feb 15), U of A (Feb 16), Dalhousie (Feb 17) Obstetrics and Gynaecology: Alberta (Feb 16), Ottawa (Feb 17), McMaster + IMG (Feb 17), Manitoba (Feb 17) Ophthalmology: Montreal (Feb 14), Laval (Feb 14), Dalhousie (Feb 16), Sherbrooke (Feb 17) Orthopaedic Surgery: Dalhousie (Feb 10), Western (Feb 11), UBC (Feb 11), Laval (Feb 11), McMaster (Feb 14), Calgary (Feb14), McGill (Feb 14), Ottawa (Feb 16), USask (Feb 16) Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery: Calgary (Feb 15), Dalhousie (Feb 16), Western (Feb 16), McMaster (Feb 17), Manitoba (Feb 17) Pediatrics: Memorial *Refusals* (Feb 14), Ottawa *?refusals* (Feb 16), Ottawa IMG (Feb 16), Montreal (Feb 16) Plastic Surgery: Laval (Feb 12), McGill (Feb 14), Dalhousie (Feb 16), Toronto (Feb 16), Manitoba (Feb 17) PM&R: McMaster (Feb 15) Psychiatry: Manitoba (Feb 1), Memorial (Feb 3), Western (Feb 9), McMaster-Waterloo,Hamilton, & CIP (Feb 10), UBC Research Track (Feb 10), UBC (Feb 10) UBC IMG (Feb 10), Dalhousie (Feb 11), Toronto (Feb 11), Alberta (Feb 11), Montreal (14 Feb), Sherbrooke (14 Feb), Calgary (Feb 14), USask (Feb 15), Laval (16 Feb), Queen's (Feb 16), UOttawa (Feb 17), UOttawa IMG (Feb 17), NOSM (Feb 17), McGill (Feb 17) Public Health and Preventive Medicine: USask (Feb 4), Ottawa (Feb 14), Ottawa IMG (Feb 14), Toronto (Feb 15), Sherbrooke (Feb 15), UBC (Feb 16) Radiation Oncology: Manitoba (Feb 3), McMaster (Feb 7), Queen’s (Feb 10), Dalhousie (Feb 10), UBC (Feb10), Western (Feb 15), Ottawa (Feb 15) Urology: Laval (Feb 7), McGill (Feb 1), Ottawa (Feb 12) UBC (Feb 14), Manitoba (Feb 14), McMaster (Feb 14), Sherbrooke (Feb 15), Dalhousie (Feb 16), U de M (Feb 16) Vascular Surgery: Laval (Feb 13)

Queen's EM

Has anyone gotten a CaRMS update before the actual email from the program? The CaRMS update message from the program said they sent out interview times this morning but I didn't get an email (not in my junk mail either). Should I be worried the CaRMS update was a mistake?

I'm a 4th year student who going through CaRMS right now. I will graduate with a bit over ~100k in debt from undergrad and med school combined, which I've read is around the median in Canada. I'm currently parallel planning between a 5-year specialty and FM. Between rising cost of living, residency costs, exam fees, and also general expenses (eg hobbies), how do people manage to make a dent in their debt over the course of a 5 year residency on a resident salary? I don't have family to financially support me.

I'm applying EM this year and was able to get 3 EM electives (7 weeks total). The issue is that my schedules have not been ideal- on my current elective I don't work with the same staff more than twice, and I've heard from other students that they're facing similar scheduling challenges at other sites. I know one of the criteria in the new standardized reference letters is the amount of time spent with the candidate/how many shifts worked together. How many shifts should I be working with someone before I can consider asking for a strong letter? Also, is it appropriate to ask to switch into shifts with your preferred preceptor and/or ask to pick up extra shifts?

I'm really tired. I'm barely going through the motions in terms of clinical stuff. Academically I feel like I've lost any ability to learn new information, and I'm pretty sure I failed my last exam. The stakes for failing an exam at U of T are ridiculously high and faculty has confirmed on multiple occasions that they will not be doing anything to ease the load, despite the fact that our class's failure rate is double the usual rate and students have been asking for support for literally months. I'm supposed to start surgery this week and I'm so filled with dread. I don't know how to survive the next 4 months of CC3 and then go straight into electives and somehow try to impress people. Just really tired and frustrated because I feel like it doesn't need to be this hard.

We don't get any 3rd year electives, just the 14 weeks in 4th year, 2 of which are meant to be allocated for vacation(because we don't get any time off during the year save for 1 week in March) but nobody ends up taking vacation. The 2T3 class will have 2 weeks of elective time in 3rd year.

Thanks for this- I've already worked 3 shifts with this preceptor so I'll ask at the beginning of my next one so they can pay attention! This preceptor does know I'm hoping to go into emerg (we've talked about it) so I don't think it will come as a surprise request. It's 5 shifts over ~3 weeks so hopefully they will be able to see some longitudinal growth/development too!

Our EM rotation is ~4 weeks long and we do ~13-14 shifts. I have 5 shifts with the same core preceptor and the remainder of my shifts are each with a different physician. I have been getting generally strong feedback from this core preceptor and so am hoping to ask them for a reference letter but am not sure if 5 shifts would be enough for a strong letter. I have no continuity with the other docs, so I can't ask for a joint letter with someone else. I could try to pick up an extra shift or two with this preceptor if that would make a difference? Anybody have insight on EM preceptors' expectations in terms of hours/shifts worked before asking for a letter?

I guess it's probably not as efficient as it could be because I feel like I'm studying literally all the time- I'll take a few days off studying at the beginning of a rotation (mostly because I need downtime from the last exam). There's a repository of old exams/materials floating around but they're all from the early-mid 2000s so haven't been of much help, unfortunately.

I'm dreading going back to clinic on Monday. I spent my whole winter break trying to study and catch up on material/content that I'm weak on but only got through barely 10% of the stuff I wanted to. I'm so exhausted of constantly performing and trying to impress people and worrying about CaRMS and planning my career etc. I don't have mentors in med school that I can talk to and everything is so lonely and stressful to try to figure out on my own- COVID certainly hasn't helped. I'm also becoming more aware of all of the rest of life I'm missing out on- my friends outside of med are starting to get married, find houses, start families, etc and I can't picture when those things will be on my horizon. I knew all of these things going into medicine but something about the constant grind of clerkship and never feeling good enough is really wearing down on me. Does anybody have advice/suggestions for managing feelings like this?

I keep getting the feedback that I'm very keen. I'm worried that this is tacitly a bad thing (like I'm overenthusiastic, or something). I've really enjoyed clerkship so far and I've been engaged out of genuine interest, and I'm just trying to be a good clerk. Is this a polite way of telling me I need to tone it down? How is feedback like this interpreted on a MSPR?