Guest pasoo Posted May 11, 2004 Report Share Posted May 11, 2004 www.carms.ca/stats/stats_index.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ian Wong Posted May 11, 2004 Report Share Posted May 11, 2004 Hey, thanks for the heads-up! Ian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest KatieKat Posted May 18, 2004 Report Share Posted May 18, 2004 Within the link is a chart outlining the second round matches for Canadian medical graduates from the years 1995-2003. Now, I understand that a student who graduates in 2003 might decide to go unmatched for a year in order to get try again to get into their dream specialty. But why would a 1995 graduate be applying for residency? Would this be the case of someone become unhappy in their chosen speciality, wanting to upgrade their training, etc. Or do some people go unmatched year after year after year? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ian Wong Posted May 18, 2004 Report Share Posted May 18, 2004 Is this the chart you're looking at? www.carms.ca/stats/pgy-1_2003/page20_table18-19.htm#top If so, I don't think it's saying what you are reading it as. This is complicated by the fact that in the Table XIX, under the column "# of Cdn Students unmatched in first iteration" and the row "2003", the table reads 105, when it actually should read 115 (Cdn Students unmatched in the first iteration of the 2003 match). What the table is saying is that in 2003, there were 115 unmatched students, and of these 85 applied for spots in the second round, and 81 matched in the second round. That means that a total of 115-81 = 34 unmatched students after both the first and second rounds, who most likely all re-applied for residency spots in CaRMS 2004. It does not mean that there were 65 applicants from 1995 who went unmatched in this year's CaRMS match, or that there were 71 applicants from 1996 who went unmatched in this year's CaRMS match; those numbers refer to people who went unmatched in CaRMS 1995 and CaRMS 1996 respectively. Having said that, it is possible (although difficult) for a current practising physician to retrain by what is known as a re-entry residency position. These positions usually are not filled through the CaRMS match, but rather may be advertised through the CMA or other medical journals/news sources. The trouble is that there are not that many re-entry positions out there, because there is limited funding available to create these extra residency positions. Most people who choose to go unmatched only go unmatched for one year, simply due to the fact that all your med school debt is now gathering interest, and you usually don't have a significant income source. It would be profoundly unusual to see an applicant go unmatched for two successive years (usually those people will pick up a spot of some sort in the second round, so someone who went completely unmatched in CaRMS 2003, and also went unmatched in the first round of CaRMS 2004, is almost guaranteed to take a spot in the second round of CaRMS 2004 rather than go unmatched and try again in the first round of CaRMS 2005). Ian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest DonaldKaufman Posted May 18, 2004 Report Share Posted May 18, 2004 Ian, Is it possible to not enter the match when you graduate, do a fellowship-type year with a doctor who practices in the field you'd like to match into, and then enter the match the following year? I was mainly thinking in terms of a very competitive speciality, where a few publications and some research might help you secure a match when do enter CARMS that following year. Have you ever heard of anyone doing this? -DK Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest coastal79 Posted May 18, 2004 Report Share Posted May 18, 2004 From what I've read, if you don't match, or, choose not to enter the match, you can enter the next year in the first round. So, if you want dermatology, for example, don't put any backups, and then don't match, you're still good to go in the 1st round of the next year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ian Wong Posted May 18, 2004 Report Share Posted May 18, 2004 If you are looking to do something like that, a far better, and sneakier, option would be to take the year off between Med 3 and Med 4. This preserves your medical student status and allows you to do 12 months of electives/research divided any way you like. Needless to say, you will literally dominate all over your electives and probably be able to obtain "walking on water" type letters of reference, particularly when you do your fourth year electives, because you've literally got 12 extra months of experience in that specialty relative to all the other Med 4 students you're rotating with. If you do your route, and graduate from medical school, you lose your medical student license, and are no longer able to do any clinical electives (you are restricted to research only). One of the folks from U of A took a year off during medical school to do ENT research (I think they have a program there to do a Master's degree in surgery, or something like that?), and matched ENT this year. I think it's quite rare to take this mid-medical school year off, but if you've got a genuine interest in research, publishing 1 or more papers in that field will definitely show committment to your specialty (which is of prime importance when it comes to giving out residency interviews). Ian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest DonaldKaufman Posted May 19, 2004 Report Share Posted May 19, 2004 Thanks for that advice Ian! I was unaware that if you took a year off between graduation and residency you would be restricted to research that year, with no clinical stuff. Thanks again! Someone had suggested that route to me, and I just wanted to see if it was completely unheard of or not. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest KatieKat Posted May 19, 2004 Report Share Posted May 19, 2004 Oh thank you Ian. I see where I went wrong now! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest physiology Posted May 19, 2004 Report Share Posted May 19, 2004 Hello Ian, Thanks for that juicy tidbit on doing a gap year between M3 and M4. Do you still have to pay tuition for that year? I mean more and more people will find out about this and I hope the government takes notice and adds more residency spots to the super competitive fields. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest moo Posted May 19, 2004 Report Share Posted May 19, 2004 I think it's quite rare to take this mid-medical school year off, but if you've got a genuine interest in research, publishing 1 or more papers in that field will definitely show committment to your specialty (which is of prime importance when it comes to giving out residency interviews). This is very common in the US. My friend's sister took a year off to do a fellowship at the NIH (Howard Hughes fellowship) between third and fourth years and is just graduating now. She matched easily top choice at UCSF Medicine. A lot of my classmates are taking a year off between 2nd and 3rd year to do research in the hopes of strengthening their CVs. It is not uncommon and shouldn't be considered sneaky at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ian Wong Posted May 20, 2004 Report Share Posted May 20, 2004 Yeah, but this is yet another one of those inter-country quirks where the US and Canada differ. In Canada, you would be in the very vast minority of people to choose to extend your med school by an additional year. Similarly in Canada, it would be very common to do some 2-4 away electives (while in the US, 1 away elective is usually considered sufficient; I've even heard many people argue that doing an away elective can hurt your chances!) to aid in matching. Similarly, writing thank you letters is absolutely mandatory in the US, as can be writing letters of intent (little back door letters to your top choice programs to let them know that you are ranking them #1, etc), while writing a similar such letter in Canada would be considered extremely bad form. Ian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest cracked30 Posted May 20, 2004 Report Share Posted May 20, 2004 I think thank you letters are mandatory in Canada too. If you want to show respect and reveal you are a polite and thoughtful person. It's a sign of good upbringing, and I have heard consultants say as such. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest RAK2005 Posted May 21, 2004 Report Share Posted May 21, 2004 I think it depends on your feel of the program. Some of the old school surgeons I worked for in London hardly have the time to read their own mail. I think it really varies. For 1/2 of my electives I sent letters, and the other half I didn't. I just sat down at the end of my elective and thanked them in person. If you leave a poor impression, a thank you card "ain't gonna fix it". My 2 cents. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest marbledust Posted May 22, 2004 Report Share Posted May 22, 2004 I have to agree with cracked that sending a thank you note is a good idea. It won't help you if you blew the interview, but it's just a polite thing to do - even if the surgeons or whatever are too busy to read them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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