does undergrad school for MD affect residency options?

[Guest mosquitoba]

Hi all -

I'm in the process of deciding between medical schools for the fall. I've been accepted at Manitoba and Calgary and am waiting to hear from Western and Queens. I was wondering if anyone knows if the school you attend to earn your MD has an effect on your competitiveness in the CaRMs match process.

 

I have looked at the CaRMS site and attempted to understand it but to be honest I was a little confused. It seems that most graduates from nearly all the schools (exception of Quebec - they don't participate in the match?) match within their top three residencies of choice (please correct me if i'm misinterpreting the data). For example, if one looks at the report for "Canadian graduates Match Results by Choice Discipline and Medical School 2005 Match First Iteration", it seems like only 6.8% of Manitoba grads do not match within their top pick of discipline (but not necessarily in their top program?). Does this number reflect the smaller size of Manitoba's medical school, or does it reflect a difference in the quality of the applicants, the programs the applicants applied to, or what?! (I'm thinking that say if many Manitoba grads went for Family Med, since there are lots of spots many of them would have gotten their top pick resulting in the 6.8% value?)

 

I haven't really got a strong idea of what I'd like to do in residency, or even if I'll get there but I'm hoping that a clearer idea of the CaRMS data will help me make my choice. Any insight at all would be appreciated!

 

Thanks

Mosquitoba

[Guest therealcrackers]

The percentage of a given class that doesn't get first choices in CaRMS varies year to year with each school.

 

If you look at some of the other threads about which school is best (what your question boils down to) three things are clear:

 

1) The degree of variability in Canadian medical school quality is much less than in the States. Uniformally, you will get a GOOD education.

 

2) The best fit for you matters for residency as well as medical school. You are more likely to be successful in med school, and therefore more competitive for the residency of your choice if you are at a school that fits your style and interests. NOMS may not be the best place for plastic surgery down the line, as an example. If you like independent work, Mac is a great option. If you like a smaller class size, consider Saskatchewan, Memorial or Queen's. What is YOUR preference?

 

3) Certain schools do have certain strengths. Alberta has an outstanding reputation for internal medicine and a surgically oriented obstetrics program (as an example). If you know now what you want to do, that may play into your choice about an undergraduate medical school.

 

But! Do you really know what you want to do before you even start? Have you considered all of the options, and some of the disciplines you may not even see until late in 3rd year? If you really want to do an elective at another school to see what the situation is like there, you can find time to do so in the summers, or during your elective time in clerkship and/or fourth year. There are other changes that can occur over three or four years that may affect your decision, like a spouse or partner.

 

Ultimately, doing an elective and finding a good fit for residency sometime during the last two years of medical school is what will clinch things for you. You are not LOCKED in to a particular location for residency based on where you do your undergraduate medical education. You will have to get yourself noticed at the school where you want to do your residency training at some point. Statistics are a nice guideline, but they only make your head hurt after a while. Good luck!

[Guest MedAnxiety]

Sorry if I'm sounding stupid but, you mentioned you have to get noticed sometime in the school that you want to do your residency. I'm assuming you just mean you should do some/more electives in that city/province? But how will that make the SCHOOL recognize you? Thanks!

[Guest tim23]

mosquitoba: I'm almost in the exact same position as you and have basically decided to stay home, I've looked into the residency stuff and carms matching extensively. Basically unless you have a really competitive program at a specific school in mind (ie plastics at U of T)you will be fine at U of M. You can do electives at other schools and this should give you the ins you need to do residency there once you decide what you want to do. For what its worth from the schools your looking at only Western would even tempt me to turn down U of M.

 

By the way what undergrad did you get, I'm from U of W.

 

Tim

[Guest mosquitoba]

Hey Tim

I did my undergrad at UW too. You said you'd only consider Western as an alternative to UM from my "list"... just wondering, why not Queens?

 

Mosquitoba

[Guest marbledust]

just wonderign why not Queens?

 

Or Calgary....

[Guest mosquitoba]

hey marbledust,

Good point. I guess I neglected to say that I'm now deciding between U of M, Queens, and UWO (although my decision could be made a lot more quickly, depending on the news I get on the 31st!). I loved my interview weekend at Calgary, and was really impressed with the students and the facilities. However, after a lot of thinking, I decided that Calgary is not the right place for me, for personal reasons.

Mosquitoba