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Visiting Electives Cancelled for Class of 2023


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2 hours ago, zoxy said:

Because CARMs is pretty arbitrary anyway. It's a joke of a system that we have.

Schools take away objective methods of evaluation, which isn't a problem with the match initially because there are a lot of spots per students-> They then simultaneously increase medical school spots while decreasing residency spots, especially for competitive specialties and surgery.-> The match becomes tight and people lean heavily on a two week audition but that's not enough for good evaluation so process becomes arbitrary->Then schools cancel electives because "data shows that electives are ineffective."

Self perpetuating cycle. Nonetheless this was a long time coming. Along with standardized reference letters and MRSP across all schools and specialties.

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I predict the effect will be worse for those with low SES. The few $ one saves from elective cost is insignificant to those with high SES anyways.

Those coming from medical family or well connected, deep rooted upper class family can find backdoor ways of making connections. It might just be as easy as your parent send a text message to their old classmate or golf buddy saying you're interested in the field etc.

What if you come from a non-medical family or your family is new to Canada? Then I guess the only option is to bust your ass knocking on people's doors hoping someone opens. Probably feel like a Walmart cashier pushing their Mastercard at the checkout some days lol.

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17 hours ago, insomnias said:

 

I considered it, but the deadline on a chargeback is 45-120 days from the date of purchase (most of us purchased in December 2019, covid struck in March 2020, there were months of uncertainty until we finally knew for certain in like mid-2021 that they wouldn't happen)

You can technically still take them to small court claims but if it's only 200$ too much of a hassle... I know people have done that for plane tickets

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2 hours ago, shikimate said:

I predict the effect will be worse for those with low SES. The few $ one saves from elective cost is insignificant to those with high SES anyways.

Those coming from medical family or well connected, deep rooted upper class family can find backdoor ways of making connections. It might just be as easy as your parent send a text message to their old classmate or golf buddy saying you're interested in the field etc.

What if you come from a non-medical family or your family is new to Canada? Then I guess the only option is to bust your ass knocking on people's doors hoping someone opens. Probably feel like a Walmart cashier pushing their Mastercard at the checkout some days lol.

Yes, I've definitely seen and experienced it myself. Also, very true for small fields. I've heard that even now there is significant variation in elective time in one speciality across medical schools. (e.g. doing plastics for 8 weeks in Toronto vs only doing it for limited time at schools with a cap)

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On 1/7/2022 at 2:01 PM, zoxy said:

Isn't it a bit premature to be making this decision right now? We're 8 months away from September when most 4 year schools have the bulk of their electives. Just because the situation is dire in some provinces right now, it doesn't necessarily mean that things will remain the same 8 months from now. Of course, the medical schools and the AFMC will take the easy decision by canceling away electives. They could have given people the option of arranging both home and away electives, while telling them they're not set in stone and they'll see how things are a few months from now.

I find this bizarre as the decision was initially made to stop the spread. But we're at 29.4 percent of tests being positive nationally, that ship has long ago sailed. Triple vaxxed Medical Students can't do away electives but yesterday at Pearson there were 14 arrivals from Montreal, 11 from Vancouver, 14 from NYC, 10 from London UK, and 6 from Cancun. But god forbid if a triple vaxxed UBC student does and elective at Ottawa.

Most departments at the hospitals I'm working are barely functional as it is because of the impact of Covid. The last thing needed is clerks from other schools who have no idea how things work, try to impress for a few weeks and then leave. Other thing is, doing a rotation in many competitive specialties would be useless right now unless you're seeking a residency in orthopedic thumb twiddling. For instance, for two consecutive weeks on a CTU rotation last spring, I didn't have a patient to my name and the clerk I was supervising had one. Do you really want to spend hundreds of dollars on an away rotation to end up in a situation like this where you won't learn anything and won't get a chance to impress anyone anyway?

I'm not saying this to be rude or mean to clerks. We've all been there and I absolutely enjoyed doing away rotations all over Canada, but sadly now is not the time both in terms of teaching opportunities and necessity to keep the system running. I hope that away rotations will return ASAP, but as long as Covid isn't pretty much gone and human resources are back to a more manageable level, it's not time yet.

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1 hour ago, Snowmen said:

Most departments at the hospitals I'm working are barely functional as it is because of the impact of Covid. The last thing needed is clerks from other schools who have no idea how things work, try to impress for a few weeks and then leave. Other thing is, doing a rotation in many competitive specialties would be useless right now unless you're seeking a residency in orthopedic thumb twiddling. For instance, for two consecutive weeks on a CTU rotation last spring, I didn't have a patient to my name and the clerk I was supervising had one. Do you really want to spend hundreds of dollars on an away rotation to end up in a situation like this where you won't learn anything and won't get a chance to impress anyone anyway?

I'm not saying this to be rude or mean to clerks. We've all been there and I absolutely enjoyed doing away rotations all over Canada, but sadly now is not the time both in terms of teaching opportunities and necessity to keep the system running. I hope that away rotations will return ASAP, but as long as Covid isn't pretty much gone and human resources are back to a more manageable level, it's not time yet.

Today I Learned:

September 2022 = January 2022 = Spring 2021

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3 minutes ago, Snowmen said:

Are you insinuating that the thousands of healthcare workers missing right now will miraculously be back in a few months and we'll all be in wonderland?

I have no clue what things will look like. That's why I don't think making plans 8 months in advance is the way to go. I'd rather let individual programs and students make those decisions about electives when the time comes, not the administrators.

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15 hours ago, Snowmen said:

Most departments at the hospitals I'm working are barely functional as it is because of the impact of Covid. The last thing needed is clerks from other schools who have no idea how things work, try to impress for a few weeks and then leave. Other thing is, doing a rotation in many competitive specialties would be useless right now unless you're seeking a residency in orthopedic thumb twiddling. For instance, for two consecutive weeks on a CTU rotation last spring, I didn't have a patient to my name and the clerk I was supervising had one. Do you really want to spend hundreds of dollars on an away rotation to end up in a situation like this where you won't learn anything and won't get a chance to impress anyone anyway?

I'm not saying this to be rude or mean to clerks. We've all been there and I absolutely enjoyed doing away rotations all over Canada, but sadly now is not the time both in terms of teaching opportunities and necessity to keep the system running. I hope that away rotations will return ASAP, but as long as Covid isn't pretty much gone and human resources are back to a more manageable level, it's not time yet.

I think you are right about this. It's just frustrating that the elective policy/cap is not the same at each medical school. Some medical school do not even have certain residency programs. It's brutal for students. Anybody know if there's been a trend for schools to take their own students more? In smaller specialities?

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52 minutes ago, dooogs said:

I think you are right about this. It's just frustrating that the elective policy/cap is not the same at each medical school. Some medical school do not even have certain residency programs. It's brutal for students. Anybody know if there's been a trend for schools to take their own students more? In smaller specialities?

Definitely sucks for a lot of people. It's also not very fair for some students to have 8 weeks of a specialty available to them and for others to have only 2 weeks. I know part of the reason electives may not be happening is it would not be fair to some schools, but this is just opening the flood gates for back door electives and nepotism gang moves.

Regardless many schools still took students outside of their own in the past 2 years., Even in smaller specialities!

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I'm wondering if there has been any discussion about students just doing visiting electives anyways - if a visiting school will take you?

My understanding is that the decision to not provide visiting electives was based on technical issues and the portal not being ready, not necessarily because of the pandemic. This is obviously unfortunate and very avoidable.

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50 minutes ago, Medico22 said:

I'm wondering if there has been any discussion about students just doing visiting electives anyways - if a visiting school will take you?

My understanding is that the decision to not provide visiting electives was based on technical issues and the portal not being ready, not necessarily because of the pandemic. This is obviously unfortunate and very avoidable.

You can't just take two weeks off school during your electives period. Your school will expect you to complete an elective at your home institution. 2022s were told that if they do "weekend electives" like people have done in the past and they get caught its a match violation (very bad vibes)

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51 minutes ago, Medico22 said:

I'm wondering if there has been any discussion about students just doing visiting electives anyways - if a visiting school will take you?

My understanding is that the decision to not provide visiting electives was based on technical issues and the portal not being ready, not necessarily because of the pandemic. This is obviously unfortunate and very avoidable.

AFAIK, my med school had a policy against us arranging for our own site visits/electives (and vice versa, they wouldn't accept students from other schools). IMHO, there are better and less risky ways to get to know people are your target program (e.g., just ask residents at your home program to connect you with their colleagues at other schools, research, open house/Q&As)

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3 hours ago, QueenStan said:

You can't just take two weeks off school during your electives period. Your school will expect you to complete an elective at your home institution. 2022s were told that if they do "weekend electives" like people have done in the past and they get caught its a match violation (very bad vibes)

On the same note, if you were to go work with a community physician ( in their own privately owned practice), on your own vacation time (winter, March or summer break), I don't think you can realistically be punished for that. Just like someone can use their vacation time to go travel during COVID ( although they probably shouldn't) realistically I don't see how that violates any rules.

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On 1/8/2022 at 6:49 PM, QueenStan said:

Deans voted no because of COVID risks and it was a split vote not unanimous from what we've been told. I'm sure you can appreciate the COVID risk of having thousands of students traveling between hospitals. It isn't as "plain and simple" as you make it out to be. If you're a 2023 I understand why you're mad, but people want electives to happen. This isn't some conspiracy.

This is wrong, it was unanimous.

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On 1/10/2022 at 10:50 PM, Pakoon said:

On the same note, if you were to go work with a community physician ( in their own privately owned practice), on your own vacation time (winter, March or summer break), I don't think you can realistically be punished for that. Just like someone can use their vacation time to go travel during COVID ( although they probably shouldn't) realistically I don't see how that violates any rules.

UBC 2022s were told if they participated in clinical experiences that were not sanctioned by the school (which explicitly said summer electives were not allowed due to covid) they would not be practicing within the scope of their medical license issued by the College, which could carry siginficant consequences if they were caught.

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13 minutes ago, Redpill said:

UBC 2022s were told if they participated in clinical experiences that were not sanctioned by the school (which explicitly said summer electives were not allowed due to covid) they would not be practicing within the scope of their medical license issued by the College, which could carry siginficant consequences if they were caught.

That is interesting because student affairs introduced us to the possibility of non-credit summer electives in their most recent talk with us (early Dec, prior to omnicron worsening). I emailed them for clarity about whether or not we can do these given the incoming OOP elective cancelling, but have yet to get a response. Based on your reply, I'm guessing it'll be a "no". 

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4 hours ago, Redpill said:

UBC 2022s were told if they participated in clinical experiences that were not sanctioned by the school (which explicitly said summer electives were not allowed due to covid) they would not be practicing within the scope of their medical license issued by the College, which could carry siginficant consequences if they were caught.

Even if they are shadowing? As in not providing any patient care whatsoever? Sounds kind of unreasonable if they were just watching.

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9 hours ago, Pakoon said:

Even if they are shadowing? As in not providing any patient care whatsoever? Sounds kind of unreasonable if they were just watching.

I'll just paste the actual note that was sent back in May: (note that this was revised in December to allow shadowing and non-credit clinical activities again, although that was shortly before omicron started)

Shadowing/ Non-Credit Clinical Activities:

Shadowing in Years 1 & 2, and Non-Credit Clinical Activities in year 3 & 4 are currently on hold due to the severe situation many hospital and preceptors are facing around the province due to the COVID-19 Pandemic.  

This situation has recently been reviewed and we will continue to review it as the circumstances around the Pandemic change.  We next plan to review the possibility re-establishing of Shadowing and Non-Credit Clinical Activities in August 2021.  

Students should not engage in self-funded liability insurance for Shadowing or Non-Credit Clinical Activities during their summer vacation as this goes against current UBC policy.  For further clarification, please refer to Policy 028 or contact your Assistant Dean Student Affairs or Assistant Dean Curricular at your site.

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13 hours ago, struggling2getin said:

That is interesting because student affairs introduced us to the possibility of non-credit summer electives in their most recent talk with us (early Dec, prior to omnicron worsening). I emailed them for clarity about whether or not we can do these given the incoming OOP elective cancelling, but have yet to get a response. Based on your reply, I'm guessing it'll be a "no". 

I think you might still have a shot. They cancelled it for the 2022s in May (see above note, you probably received it as well?), and re-instated them in December. To my knowledge they haven't cancelled it again yet.

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On 1/10/2022 at 12:45 PM, Pakoon said:

Definitely sucks for a lot of people. It's also not very fair for some students to have 8 weeks of a specialty available to them and for others to have only 2 weeks. I know part of the reason electives may not be happening is it would not be fair to some schools, but this is just opening the flood gates for back door electives and nepotism gang moves.

Regardless many schools still took students outside of their own in the past 2 years., Even in smaller specialities!

I can't speak for every specialty, but I'm on my program's admission committee and what's certain is that we won't penalize applicants because it was literally impossible for them to do electives in our specialty or our program. Of course, actions speak louder than words, and last year all (yes, we are a smaller specialty but one of Canada's largent programs in that specialty) of our new residents have been from schools other than our home school.

If you would've been a strong applicant in a normal year, I'm confident that it wont affect you at all.

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56 minutes ago, Snowmen said:

If you would've been a strong applicant in a normal year, I'm confident that it wont affect you at all.

Historically, being a "strong applicant" to many competitive specialties was fairly correlated to number of electives (of course QC used to have grades as well).  In a way taking electives in one discipline had a certain risk/reward - now I wonder if some applicants are better able to cross apply to many disciplines simply by using the pandemic to justify not having much commitment to a discipline and potentially squeezing some of the other applicants out (who normally would show more "commitment").  Or maybe in QC the grades tradition means that electives were more secondary to overall record?

https://www.carms.ca/data-reports/r1-data-reports/electives.

 

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On 1/13/2022 at 10:23 PM, Redpill said:

UBC 2022s were told if they participated in clinical experiences that were not sanctioned by the school (which explicitly said summer electives were not allowed due to covid) they would not be practicing within the scope of their medical license issued by the College, which could carry siginficant consequences if they were caught.

Same for UofC. All extracurricular experiences (e.g., shadowing, career exploration days) have to be registered with the school. I think it's for a practical reason, which is that we won't get malpratice coverage unless we register it beforehand. But it also means, you can't be doing stuff without the school knowing.

That's not to say that people haven't been skirting the policy. But some have gotten caught and they all had to have meetings with the dean, so not taken lightly either.

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