.

[hamham]

2 hours ago, JohnGrisham said:

What does "belittled the CaRMS process" mean? As in just didnt take things seriously?

Did not work hard enough to impress during electives to get good reference letters; Did not work hard enough on personal statement or CV; Did not bother to work on interview skills; Did not rank enough schools. They pretty much thought matching to FM was a sure-thing and took things for granted. 

[jlkhhylyiluh6]

12 hours ago, JohnGrisham said:

In western Canada, there are few FM spots left after round 1.  For english speaking only, the Quebec spots are mostly inaccessible.  

you can always learn french. In Quebec the government helps pay for french lessons.

It just seems to me that people are whining on here that there are no spots, but then when shown all the spots in quebec they simply go "welp french is too hard, those dont count", just makes me think how badly they actually want a spot vs feel entitled to their dream spot. And sorry, not everyones perfect dream can come true. But there is a job there for everyone, you just need to be a little more flexible.

Also, residency is not your entire life (especially family med). After 2-3 years you can move wherever you want, write the appropriate licenscing exams, and work wherever you want. Just about how much effort you want to put into it.

[JohnGrisham]

3 hours ago, beeboop said:

you can always learn french. In Quebec the government helps pay for french lessons.

It just seems to me that people are whining on here that there are no spots, but then when shown all the spots in quebec they simply go "welp french is too hard, those dont count", just makes me think how badly they actually want a spot vs feel entitled to their dream spot. And sorry, not everyones perfect dream can come true. But there is a job there for everyone, you just need to be a little more flexible.

Also, residency is not your entire life (especially family med). After 2-3 years you can move wherever you want, write the appropriate licenscing exams, and work wherever you want. Just about how much effort you want to put into it.

I think its alot easier to say "learn french" then actually do it. If you don't see how ludicrous it sounds to tell someone whos probably in their mid-late 20s and going through a rigorous program such as medicine to learn a 2nd language for the first time on top of that....Verbal, reading, writing for notes. Kudos to you if you did so.

And the quebec govt paying for lessons while you're in residency doesn't exactly help you to get into the residency in the first place. Having learned a 2nd language late in life, it takes a lot of time, practice and emersion to get to a proficient enough level..especially in the context of communicating in a sensitive setting like that of a doctor-patient relationship.

As for entitlement, i think its a bit unfair to say someone is entitled to simply wanting a spot somewhere in Canada, in the language they speak.  Thankfully i dont think things are bad enough that people will start recommending "Do your USMLES, and learn french if you want to match!".

Given there are a large amount of unfilled spots in Quebec, it would seem prudent to close down a few and transfer funding elsewhere. But of course, workforce planning and managing funds isn't the governments strong suit.


 

[la marzocco]

22 minutes ago, JohnGrisham said:

I think its alot easier to say "learn french" then actually do it. If you don't see how ludicrous it sounds to tell someone whos probably in their mid-late 20s and going through a rigorous program such as medicine to learn a 2nd language for the first time on top of that....Verbal, reading, writing for notes. Kudos to you if you did so.

And the quebec govt paying for lessons while you're in residency doesn't exactly help you to get into the residency in the first place. Having learned a 2nd language late in life, it takes a lot of time, practice and emersion to get to a proficient enough level..especially in the context of communicating in a sensitive setting like that of a doctor-patient relationship.

As for entitlement, i think its a bit unfair to say someone is entitled to simply wanting a spot somewhere in Canada, in the language they speak.  Thankfully i dont think things are bad enough that people will start recommending "Do your USMLES, and learn french if you want to match!".

Given there are a large amount of unfilled spots in Quebec, it would seem prudent to close down a few and transfer funding elsewhere. But of course, workforce planning and managing funds isn't the governments strong suit.

It is difficult to be comfortable in a language, let alone be adept in delivery in the context of physician-patient settings. Having said that, I found learning French became much easier once I moved to Montreal for school. Day-to-day immersion is so important and most Canadian med schools outside of Qc do not get this opportunity. In order for someone to have a strong enough command of the language and to have confidence to use it, one needs day to day practice.

For me, I am fascinated by languages - I do not mind sparing a few hours a week on top of my med school schedule to learn more about French. There is a French medical workshop at McGill every Saturday morning to help us anglophones be more comfortable in French. I do not mind reading news and forcing myself to communicate in French. But, again, this is solely because I enjoy languages. I never thought about learning French to improving my access to CaRMS, but if that is a positive byproduct, great. But, to echo what JohnGrisham said, things are no so dire to the point (yet) where we should be doling out advices like "Learn French!" to improve match outcomes.

[indefatigable]

1 hour ago, JohnGrisham said:

I think its alot easier to say "learn french" then actually do it. If you don't see how ludicrous it sounds to tell someone whos probably in their mid-late 20s and going through a rigorous program such as medicine to learn a 2nd language for the first time on top of that....Verbal, reading, writing for notes. Kudos to you if you did so.

And the quebec govt paying for lessons while you're in residency doesn't exactly help you to get into the residency in the first place. Having learned a 2nd language late in life, it takes a lot of time, practice and emersion to get to a proficient enough level..especially in the context of communicating in a sensitive setting like that of a doctor-patient relationship.

As for entitlement, i think its a bit unfair to say someone is entitled to simply wanting a spot somewhere in Canada, in the language they speak.  Thankfully i dont think things are bad enough that people will start recommending "Do your USMLES, and learn french if you want to match!".

Given there are a large amount of unfilled spots in Quebec, it would seem prudent to close down a few and transfer funding elsewhere. But of course, workforce planning and managing funds isn't the governments strong suit.
 

Well said!  My understanding that residency spots are a provincial issue so depends on Québec more so than the Feds.  Fed to provincial transfers are already a contentious issue, but maybe there'd be some leverage there...  

I also think it's a much higher yield strategy for most individuals to write the MLEs, than it's to learn French and it's a little much to ask both.  Sure, US FM residency is three years so the comparison really then becomes 1 year of French plus 2 year residency in QC say vs US route.  From a practical point of view, I think that a lot of US sites would be happy to have CMGs, whereas Québec does put up quite a few barriers for OOP (contracts, difficult language tests..)... so people shouldn't be expecting to work in downtown Mtl.  

[Edict]

11 hours ago, hamham said:

Did not work hard enough to impress during electives to get good reference letters; Did not work hard enough on personal statement or CV; Did not bother to work on interview skills; Did not rank enough schools. They pretty much thought matching to FM was a sure-thing and took things for granted. 

If there are people who did not do all those things, then I think it can be logical to let them not match. Ultimately, I wouldn't want someone who does not try, to become my own doctor, but if it is just one or two things where they did well on electives, worked hard, but probably took things a bit too easy for the application (which happens when people aren't fully informed or are misinformed), then they deserve the chance to match. 

[JohnGrisham]

6 hours ago, calcan said:

Well said!  My understanding that residency spots are a provincial issue so depends on Québec more so than the Feds.  Fed to provincial transfers are already a contentious issue, but maybe there'd be some leverage there...  

I also think it's a much higher yield strategy for most individuals to write the MLEs, than it's to learn French and it's a little much to ask both.  Sure, US FM residency is three years so the comparison really then becomes 1 year of French plus 2 year residency in QC say vs US route.  From a practical point of view, I think that a lot of US sites would be happy to have CMGs, whereas Québec does put up quite a few barriers for OOP (contracts, difficult language tests..)... so people shouldn't be expecting to work in downtown Mtl.  

Yep, I think a reasonable approach is for people to write Step 2 CK during clerkship(It seems Canadian schools prepare fairly well for this, given that even during preclinicals much of the Step 2 material was very approachable). Then if one does not match, finish up QE1 by the time everyone else takes it and prep Step 1 alongside until July/August. This way you can reapply CaRMs and NRMP at the same time. 

I think that is the best, least intrusive option. Step 1 has a lot of material that isn't all that useful in Canadian curriculums, or rather overkill. So may as well just save that till you actually absolutely need to take it. Whereas Step 2 is much more useful clinically. 

[indefatigable]

On 8 janvier 2018 at 5:49 PM, JohnGrisham said:

Yep, I think a reasonable approach is for people to write Step 2 CK during clerkship(It seems Canadian schools prepare fairly well for this, given that even during preclinicals much of the Step 2 material was very approachable). Then if one does not match, finish up QE1 by the time everyone else takes it and prep Step 1 alongside until July/August. This way you can reapply CaRMs and NRMP at the same time. 

I think that is the best, least intrusive option. Step 1 has a lot of material that isn't all that useful in Canadian curriculums, or rather overkill. So may as well just save that till you actually absolutely need to take it. Whereas Step 2 is much more useful clinically. 

I think this makes sense, but also means for sure doing a "gap" year if one didn't match (with all the work and cost involved).  I suppose writing Step 1 earlier (after MS2) could work for some, but would mean using the "last" summer to study for a test with the opportunity cost of doing other activities.  OTOH it would mean being able to apply to NRMP before being unmatched, were that to possibly occur.  There's good reason to write Step 2 during clerkship, which makes sense in terms of curriculum and usefulness.  The "gap" year might also permit people to learn French too, albeit with extra cost (and a very busy year - with at least 2 standardized exams + scrambling to be competitive).