Unfilled carms spots

[GrouchoMarx]

22 minutes ago, MD_2021 said:

What's the point of this? Why wouldn't Ottawa want the best candidates?

Its an IMG only spot that canadians are prohibited from applying to.

[rmorelan]

43 minutes ago, humhum said:

I think the number of unfilled spots in a highly desirable city like Calgary is a very significant outlier this year. We have not seen double digit open spots in a top living quality city in FM for half a decade now.

fair enough! I was just chalking it up to the random weirdness of CARMS ha Every year there is one or two things I just cannot seem to figure out how exactly they happened. 

[BoopityBoop]

5 hours ago, rmorelan said:

that vascular spot is the only unfilled surgery spot in the country. 

Holy. How did a spot, especially in vascular in 2018, go unmatched?

[humhum]

5 minutes ago, BoopityBoop said:

Holy. How did a spot, especially in vascular in 2018, go unmatched?

From the first day of med school, every vascular surgeon and vasc resident wanted to tell us how there are no jobs anywhere in Canada. I think the message registered.

[BoopityBoop]

Just now, humhum said:

From the first day of med school, every vascular surgeon and vasc resident wanted to tell us how there are no jobs anywhere in Canada. I think the message registered.

I heard there was nearly a 2:1 ratio between interviewees and spots for vascular, which is why I'm kind of surprised there's an unfilled spot.

[humhum]

1 minute ago, BoopityBoop said:

I heard there was nearly a 2:1 ratio between interviewees and spots for vascular, which is why I'm kind of surprised there's an unfilled spot.

Chances are most people interviewing had other but related first choices, such as gen surg, ENT, uro, etc... personally I'm more shocked about the open anesthesia spot. At our school it seemed like every third person wanted to go into that.

[rmorelan]

people keep focusing on the one open spot, ha, I am more impressed that every other possible surgery spot was filled. 

Overall the picture seems close to what many expected. A few pockets here and there but not really a lot left overall. If you don't want family medicine or don't speak french it is not a pretty picture - although again not a surprise. 

[JohnGrisham]

Is there any easy way to delineate which spots were originally CMG only and which were IMG only from round 1? 

[indefatigable]

3 hours ago, humhum said:

I think the number of unfilled spots in a highly desirable city like Calgary is a very significant outlier this year. We have not seen double digit open spots in a top living quality city in FM for half a decade now.

Don't mean to nitpick at all - last year Mcgill-Montreal had 10 spots, Calgary had 5 and Ottawa 9 (source).  This year McGill-Montreal had 7, Calgary had 11, Western-London 5 and Ottawa only 2 (source).  But like others have said, nothing is guaranteed, even in the second round.  I'd guess schools & programs that weren't satisfied with their R-1 results last year adjusted their selection procedure. 

1 hour ago, humhum said:

Chances are most people interviewing had other but related first choices, such as gen surg, ENT, uro, etc... personally I'm more shocked about the open anesthesia spot. At our school it seemed like every third person wanted to go into that.

In 2017, Vascular was ranked 1st by 8 people with 8 quota.

Also in 2017, anesth. was ranked first by 138 people with 100 total spots (Tables 11 & 12).

[Dermviser]

6 minutes ago, marrakech said:

Don't mean to nitpick at all - last year Mcgill-Montreal had 10 spots, Calgary had 5 and Ottawa 9 (source).  This year McGill-Montreal had 7, Calgary had 11, Western-London 5 and Ottawa only 2 (source).  But like others have said, nothing is guaranteed, even in the second round.  I'd guess schools & programs that weren't satisfied with their R-1 results last year adjusted their selection procedure. 

Any reason McGill-Montreal has some spots left over? I though McGill Family Medicine was one of the top family medicine program in the country? I understand they must be quite selective?

[indefatigable]

7 minutes ago, Dermviser said:

Any reason McGill-Montreal has some spots left over? I though McGill Family Medicine was one of the top family medicine program in the country? I understand they must be quite selective?

I'd speculate: i) recent legislative changes in Québec making FM less attractive; and ii) preference for English + French speaking candidates...  Pure speculation though.

[BoopityBoop]

21 minutes ago, Dermviser said:

Any reason McGill-Montreal has some spots left over? I though McGill Family Medicine was one of the top family medicine program in the country? I understand they must be quite selective?

Do people who want FM really care about "top" programs? In my experience most people who want FM rank based on their desired location and how well they thought they interviewed/were perceived by the program. I mean it's a factor, but it's not a make it or break it factor like it is for other specialties.

[indefatigable]

2 minutes ago, BoopityBoop said:

In my experience most people who want FM rank based on their desired location and how well they thought they interviewed/were perceived by the program. 

The matching algorithm works best when programs+applicants rank strictly according to their own preferences.  Ranking a program higher doesn't actually help match any better.  

[la marzocco]

On 2018-03-01 at 8:08 PM, JohnGrisham said:

Is there any easy way to delineate which spots were originally CMG only and which were IMG only from round 1? 

Good question. I was wondering the same. I think we won't have much visibility until the full R-1 data report comes out in late April. For what it's worth, the AFMC did publish some data on that for the past 4 years: 

IMGs are more likely to match to vacant 2nd iteration positions. 

[indefatigable]

9 minutes ago, la marzocco said:

Good question. I was wondering the same. I think we won't have much visibility until the full R-1 data report comes out in late April. For what it's worth, the AFMC did publish some data on that for the past 4 years: 

IMGs are more likely to match to vacant 2nd iteration positions. 

Nice post - it's easy to see that IMG positions aren't generally getting held over.  And you're right - IMGs do comparatively much better in the 2nd round.  I guess that's why there was that AFMC suggestion to keep the streaming in Round 2, to assist with unmatched CMGs.  Even for IMGs though, the second round is getting much more competitive - a somewhat steady decrease in the number and proportion of IMGs matching.  

[la marzocco]

5 minutes ago, marrakech said:

Nice post - it's easy to see that IMG positions aren't generally getting held over.  And you're right - IMGs do comparatively much better in the 2nd round.  I guess that's why there was that AFMC suggestion to keep the streaming in Round 2, to assist with unmatched CMGs.  Even for IMGs though, the second round is getting much more competitive - a somewhat steady decrease in the number and proportion of IMGs matching.  

Interestingly, the trends for PY CMG matches and IMG matches in the 2nd round are inverse. I imagine 2018 would be no exception in following this trend given the record unmatched in 2017.

[rmorelan]

32 minutes ago, marrakech said:

Nice post - it's easy to see that IMG positions aren't generally getting held over.  And you're right - IMGs do comparatively much better in the 2nd round.  I guess that's why there was that AFMC suggestion to keep the streaming in Round 2, to assist with unmatched CMGs.  Even for IMGs though, the second round is getting much more competitive - a somewhat steady decrease in the number and proportion of IMGs matching.  

is that do you think just because there are only a relative few dedicated IMG spots in the first round - proportionally aren't there more spots IMGs have access to in the second round with the loss of the CMG advantage evening out the playing field? 

I am speculating here but I think if removed the first round CMG advantage IMGs would often have an advantage - the entire world market with people often already having training in the target area plus objective evaluations of their performance and all that. 

 

[GrouchoMarx]

20 minutes ago, rmorelan said:

is that do you think just because there are only a relative few dedicated IMG spots in the first round - proportionally aren't there more spots IMGs have access to in the second round with the loss of the CMG advantage evening out the playing field? 

I am speculating here but I think if removed the first round CMG advantage IMGs would often have an advantage - the entire world market with people often already having training in the target area plus objective evaluations of their performance and all that. 

 

I dont know about objective. i know path residents who were pathologists in their home countries and they give credence to the saying 'you cant teach an old dog new tricks'. i dont think this has anything to do with age, but instead with low recruitment standards in their home countries in that they were not very smart to begin with, coupled with arrogance.

[indefatigable]

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[JohnGrisham]

26 minutes ago, marrakech said:

In Québec, there's often no CMG advantage in the first round.  Exceptionally, it never disallowed IMGs in the first round and thus never had to create those dedicated streams after a court case.  It may seem minor, but France is roughly twice the size of Canada and the pay is much better here.  So one would expect trained IMGs from France to squeeze out the CMGs in Québec, given the almost 10 fold population difference.  Oddly, this doesn't seem to happen (not to mention all the other French speaking countries).  

IMGs that match successfully are most often CSAs.  And yes, I agree they probably have written the US MLEs, possibly done more electives in a given discipline, etc.. - the contexts are very different.  I do feel that if the second round is to be truly a "second chance" for the CMGs, then keeping the streaming would allow this to occur, and also avoid increasing the backlog of unmatched graduates.  

I mean schools here have to work hard to keep LCME accreditation etc, and I think by extension including all the other factors like training cost and financial that are discussed on this site, etc., that programs should acknowledge that there are potentially outstanding CMGs still left in the second round.  I understand that programs are tempted to take IMGs - it might make a lot of sense on paper, with US MLE scores, etc.. whereas the CMG is an unmatched candidate.  Still, I'd make the case that there's still a potential for excellence - CaRMS is a difficult beast.  The alternative (at the limit) is to accept that there is de facto only a single round.  

You still have to have Canadian citizenship or PR to apply, so not sure why France would be expected to squeeze out CMGS in Quebec? Unless i'm missing something. 

[indefatigable]

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[BoopityBoop]

12 hours ago, marrakech said:

The matching algorithm works best when programs+applicants rank strictly according to their own preferences.  Ranking a program higher doesn't actually help match any better.  

I wasn't contesting that ranking higher helps with the match. I was suggesting that within "preferences", reputation and perceived "top" program is not a big factor for FM applicants versus other specialties.

Many people applying to FM are willing to accept that a program may not be the "top" program, in exchange for a nicer city or being closer to their family/loved ones. This is less likely to be the case for those, who let's say, are applying to general surgery where they give the reputation and perceived quality of a program a bigger weight in their "preferences".

[Arztin]

17 hours ago, Dermviser said:

Any reason McGill-Montreal has some spots left over? I though McGill Family Medicine was one of the top family medicine program in the country? I understand they must be quite selective?

They sere just very selective about their candidates this year. I.e. didn't rank at all people who remotely gave the impression they were backing up with FM.

[indefatigable]

2 hours ago, Arztin said:

They sere just very selective about their candidates this year. I.e. didn't rank at all people who remotely gave the impression they were backing up with FM.

That makes sense - just wondering though, do you think they will be able to find more suitable candidates in the second round  - i.e. wouldn't the CMGs with dedicated FM interest have matched (or would IMGs with FM interest be preferred)?    

[Coby]

Can cmgs apply to Dal family med second round if they didn’t apply and do mmi first iteration?