Schedule Of Clinical(Clerkship) Years

[studenten]

Hi everyone,

 

I was thinking about whether or not I should be moving out from the west-island for Med3 &4. Could someone tell me how are the schedules during clerkship years? I know it all depends on the specialty and all, but generally, do you expect to be on call for some rotations? Are there scenarios where you would finish after midnight or start during the night? Also, in med4, how many weeks/months a general student would go out of Montreal to do some electives elsewhere? If it helps, I am trying to go towards internal medicine. 

 

[feversugar]

Hey! So the day can start anywhere from 6:15-30 AM (gen surg), 7 AM (ward rotations, OB...) to 8-9 AM (FM, psych...). The end time will depend on the rotation, specific staff and specific residents (some will let you go early, others will expect you to stay, etc.). Usually for me it was between 4-7 pm. In the past year I found they were improving in general the compliance to the work load hour rules but to be honest a lot of rotations will not follow them.

 

All core rotations have call, usually a few evenings a week (you stay after your usual work day, can be until 8, 10 or midnight depending on the rotation) and two weekend days. There are some rotations that may start or end at midnight, notably the shift-based rotations such as OBS and Emerg where you do at least one week of night shift (12-7/8).

 

Electives don't usually have mandatory call, but some want to show extra interest and volunteer for them. Honestly I was super lazy and never did but other people have done it and it usually can't hurt.

 

As for away electives, I am a bad example as well because I did all my electives in MTL (McGill mostly, one UdeM) except for a two weeker in Ottawa. I did not apply to internal however. In theory you can do all of your electives elsewhere if you wish, although it's always good to do some at your home school. Perhaps someone else can give better advise!

 

Disclaimer: I was in the old curriculum so you may want some of the newer classes to verify what I said.

[MedMama]

Hi everyone,

 

I was thinking about whether or not I should be moving out from the west-island for Med3 &4. Could someone tell me how are the schedules during clerkship years? I know it all depends on the specialty and all, but generally, do you expect to be on call for some rotations? Are there scenarios where you would finish after midnight or start during the night? Also, in med4, how many weeks/months a general student would go out of Montreal to do some electives elsewhere? If it helps, I am trying to go towards internal medicine. 

I am interested in knowing this too. I live even further west (in Saint Lazare) and will be doing a long commute daily

[oshaku]

I think feversurgar gave a pretty good overview of clerkship schedule. Yes you're expected to be on call, and yes there are rotations where you start/end late. Emergency is especially shift based, so you will be expected to do shift work.

 

As for electives in med 4, it's variable depending on where you want to match. Some people want to match in Ontario/States and will do almost all of their electives (3-4 months) away. Others are geographically limited to Montreal and will do most of theirs at McGill or UdeM.

 

There are quite a number of people who live in the West island/Laval/South shore in my class. They seem to be doing fine for pre-clerk. In med-2, you will have TCP, which will introduce you to most of the core specialties and you can probably use that to figure out if the commute still works for you. You'll also get your clerkship schedule during TCP, which will also help you with planning/deciding to move or not.

[partyofurniture]

I know a resident who was living in the Hudson/St-Lazare area for all of med school and 2 years of residency before finally moving to Montreal. He drove to school/work every day, but from what I can tell, he doesn't need as many hours of sleep as most people do (also, with a car, YOU have more of a say in how fast you get to point B vs with public transport).

 

I am also from the Hudson/St-Lazare area but I'm very, very glad to have lived in an apartment downtown for the duration of med school. I really appreciated having a place to crash in Montreal after long days on the wards and being able to have that extra time to sleep (shorter commute). I'm not sure if I would have been able to do it had I lived way out west, but there's no way I will ever know.

 

Moral of the story: both are doable, but one inherently results in fewer hours of sleep than the other.

[Arztin]

Yes what Feversugar said is totally applicable. The thing about when you start morning holds true e.g. starting at 6-6:30 in the morning for surgery rounding. Often, you would need to arrive 10-15 minutes before rounding time starts to note down the vital signs etc... And yes, most of the med3 core rotations have calls. Some are night calls, some are evenings, some are over the weekend. I know in OB, some students had a full week of nights. In ER, obviously you have nights, and night shifts are from 12AM-8AM.

 

Living in West Island during clerkship is extremely unpractical because you might be placed in more ''remote'' hospitals for your med3 core rotations. e.g. psych at the Douglas, ObsGyn at Lasalle, surgery at the MGH etc... It's definitely possible but I wouldn't recommend it.

 

For students doing med3 in Montreal, they get 19 weeks of electives in total. For those doing med3 in Gatineau, they have 23 weeks of electives in total. McGill does not restrict where you do your electives. i.e. you can do them all outside of the McGill network. Also, in med3 we have 4 weeks of elctives, but you can switch the mandatory med4 geriatrics with your med3 elective. That way, med4 is only electives + 4 weeks of mandatory EM + 1 week of mandatory public health.

However, there is one requirement: it is that you have to do something in 3 different sections. https://www.mcgill.ca/ugme-electives/elective-courses

e.g. someone wants anesthesia really really bad. They can do 2 weeks of derm (separate category) and 2 weeks in cardiology (IM subsection) and the rest in anesthesia.

 

And just a heads up. So for the first year and half (FMD), staying whenever is okay since you don't need to come to morning classes, and the vast majority of mornings are non mandatory classes. However, during TCP, the 2nd part of med2, you have 2 weeks of surgery, 2 weeks of anesthesia, and 2 weeks of neuro. Depending where you are, you might have to start very early for surgery and anesthesia (very early for busy surgery services like GenSx and cardiac like 6:15, later for less busy services like vascular at like 6:30-6:45, and sometimes even later for the ''chill'' surgery services that don't have so many patients to round on), and stay very late in neuro (8am-8pm). If you live in St-Lazarre or West Island, sleeping will become an issue.