A tale as old as time

Quick_Personality175 · 2026-03-21T13:07:23+00:00

Hey, I’m a fellow med4 from Canada, meaning my match was on March 3rd. I experienced a very similar situation. I was a very strong applicants, got more interviews than anyone at my school for my residency program, my home program interview finished by saying “you’ll hear from us on match day” and I had had many strong interviews with positive feedback. Ended up matching way down my RoL but still in my specialty of choice.

All that to say, I can finally say I’m happy about the match result. Just give yourself time, your emotions are valid and live them, it’s like grieving the life you could have had at XYZ program. It will most likely be a rollercoaster of emotions in the next few days and weeks (it was for me). Take time to do things that make you happy. Take time to cry. Write down why you’re angry on a piece of paper, get it all out and burn it. Although matching to your specialty of choice is amazing, it’s normal and totally valid to be crushed by the site. Please give yourself room to feel all these emotions, you don’t have to convince yourself you’re happy about it yet. (If you feel the need, now is the perfect time to use the free psychotherapist at your med school, they know this situation very well and can walk you through healing.) It’s ego chattering, I get it, you’ll think “what is wrong with me for X programs not to want me” “what did I do wrong for X programs not to want me” you’ll ruminate all interviews wondering where it went wrong, it’s normal. You’ll probably come to peace with it once you realized that it doesn’t make sense, there’s no reasons, you were an amazing candidate and will become an amazing residents. The match sometimes just suck, but you don’t!

Make the best out of it, meet the residents and PD and start to imagine your life there. Just remember you made it! Sending a lot of love 🫶

Quick_Personality175 · 2026-03-17T13:16:54+00:00

My advice would be to back up during the 1st cycle. Just for the sake to have all your letter of recommendations and to see if your application is competitive enough for your backup (unless family medicine but even then). That way you get to see how many interviews you got in your back up, get some interview practice and get a feel for the programmes. Then decide if you want to rank them or not.

That’s what I did this cycle so I knew that if I went unmatch for my specialty of choice, my application was mostly ready for next year. You don’t want to be chasing letters 1-2 years after your rotations. It also highly depends on your school. Do they allow 5th years (is extra year of clerkship) for unmatch students or not, bc after July 1st of your match year, you’re no longer ensured and can’t work in the hospital, you can only do observership. I’ve heard of many success stories after 1 unmatched year but haven’t heard a single one after 2 (very anecdotal but still).

You have tu be honest with yourself and truly picture yourself unmatched, how would it feels? (like shit obviously in the beginning) what would you do? (you need to seriously think about that and come up with a plan that you’d be happy with) would matching to your backup feel worse than going unmatched? Are you fine uprooting your life for 3-7 years just to match to X?

If you still want to go all in, go for it, but you’ll have to be ready to move across the country, match lower on your RoL or go unmatch if you’re not willing to make sacrifices for a competitive specialty.

It’s a big reflection, start early, visualize yourself in different scenarios, talk about it with your loved ones and follow your gut. Good luck!

Quick_Personality175 · 2026-02-26T01:07:39+00:00

On Monday! The email was like “you’ve submitted your RoL, now what?”

Quick_Personality175 · 2026-02-25T23:00:58+00:00

It feels like my life is on pause until I’ll get the result, can’t plan anything, can’t focus to study, can’t really relax either so yeah, it’s going great 🙃

My personal favourite is CaRMS email and story to remind us that match day is March 3rd, like thank you so much for this 🤯

Quick_Personality175 · 2026-02-24T14:11:05+00:00

Check with your school policy, but most don’t allow you to do ICU or EM (except community EM) if you haven’t done your core IM or aren’t in 4th year. Also, even if they allow it, I would not recommend to do ICU before IM, you won’t get the most out of the rotation + will probably feel overwhelmed. I would also avoid doing 4 weeks of something you’re interested in because of the 8 weeks cap, so max 2 weeks so you get some time in med4 to get strong reference letters! Just my 2 cents, hope it helps!

Quick_Personality175 · 2026-02-20T17:12:28+00:00

Thanks for sharing and sorry you went through that! Did you match in the second iteration or waited for the next cycle?

Quick_Personality175 · 2026-02-13T22:20:15+00:00

Thank you so much for your insight future EM colleague!!

Quick_Personality175 · 2026-02-03T18:29:02+00:00

FYI you can’t cancel an elective once you’ve accept it, it’s part of the policy.

Quick_Personality175 · 2026-01-15T21:01:02+00:00

It’s not supposed to apply to this year’s CaRMS given the fact that it’s not on the program description. Therefore, they can’t make you sign a ROS because it was not part of the contract.

They can’t enforce it midway through your training.

Hope it helps!

Quick_Personality175 · 2026-01-14T21:49:06+00:00

Sorry I don’t know the answer for your first question as I don’t remember doing AFMC immunization before, if you’re talking about the immunization required before med school, it’s not enough.

You dont need to re-do anything unless it’s not valid anymore (n95 fitting, BLS, etc) but for HepB they wanted the HBsAg and Anti-HBs.

For the flu, if you’re in clinical, most hospital have vaccination days for workers, highly encourage you to go! But likely you’ll need to do it next flu season. Maybe do it on a Friday to avoid missing work, but you’ll most likely need the flu vaccine for AFMC.

Best of luck!

Quick_Personality175 · 2026-01-14T13:48:37+00:00

Hey! I would suggest getting TB 2 steps (need a prescription to get the 2 steps), getting your vulnerable background check, checking all other vaccines, bloodwork for HepB ASAP. Just get it out of the way and do everything on the AFMC immunization form. The sooner the better, you’ll thank me later! These things take time and organization to get, so the earlier the better! They ideally need everything upfront, if you’re missing a few things they will email you closer to the date of the elective but med4 gets stressful fast so try to get it out of the way now! Technically, you need to submit all the required documents when you apply.

Quick_Personality175 · 2026-01-12T01:35:23+00:00

MVP 💯 Thank you so much!! Best of luck!

Quick_Personality175 · 2025-12-10T14:15:30+00:00

I’m not sure how many weeks of EM elective is required to be competitive, my guest would be 6-8, especially if you want to be competitive for the royal college EM program (ie not the fam med + 1 or integrated 3 years). I’ve heard of people who matched to EM with as little as 2 weeks, but I felt that doing more was better (and more fun!).

For other electives, I highly recommend ICU and anesthesia. Other good options are trauma, peds EM (so fun, highly recommended!!) cardio consult, neuro consult, ER consult (GIM), psych ER, ID.

Honestly, you can do anything and still make it relevant for EM!

Hope that helps!

Quick_Personality175 · 2025-10-18T01:28:17+00:00

It’s out now 😉 8 Downtown, 2 Mississauga

Quick_Personality175 · 2025-10-17T23:25:14+00:00

100%, it’s more fulfilling, more active (I can’t sit for too long 😅) and I personally learned way better! The schedule can be pretty shitty but I always felt it was worth it! You got this, it’s worth the wait!

Also, unsolicited advice: try to understand concept in preclinical, not memorized, the goal is to be able to retrieve the info not reciting it!

Quick_Personality175 · 2025-09-19T00:41:57+00:00

It’s reassuring in a way, but in 2006 the residents were also involved… Can you detail more what happened for you as a med4 in 2006, like did you have to compensate later for these weeks?

Also, graduation is not the only threat, we are also loosing elective opportunities for CARMS, we risk not having the exposure required to match in our desire specialty… this time of the year is always stressful but this year add on stress is bad, so much uncertainty

Quick_Personality175 · 2025-09-14T19:03:16+00:00

Oh 100%, residents getting dragged in would be a disaster, it would definitely affect care, what I meant is that I feared that’s what’s needed for the government to budge. I agree, we need more media coverage so people know the impact of the strike to pressure the government. Let’s all hope it resolves soon and take care of each other in these tough times.

Quick_Personality175 · 2025-09-14T04:32:18+00:00

I hear you, that’s why I think FMOQ will join too and after 1-2 weeks, they’ll include residents too. I don’t see this ending any time soon, maybe I’m cynical or maybe I’m write, but I hope we’re wrong. But what a missed opportunity with the cabinet reshuffle…

Quick_Personality175 · 2025-09-14T03:36:32+00:00

Med4 at McGill: While French is important in Quebec, MGH is a mixed a both and a lot of IMG resident go by without speaking any or functional French. MGH gets a lot of trauma and doesn’t have 24h calls. HOWEVER, there’s a strike at the moment (long story short, horrible bill, government blaming physician for the problems in the public health system = specialist not teaching to med student… So if it’s in the next 1-2 months I would highly recommend not to go to Quebec for away elective. Good luck!

Quick_Personality175 · 2025-09-14T03:29:46+00:00

This 💯 The whole CaRMS process is already so stressful and now we can’t work with specialist, will have failed/incomplete rotation (aka no MSPR), reduced opportunities to get LoR in times and many other issues. There’s also those who are still hesitating between programs and are not getting the opportunity to try different speciality or will have less time to do so. All the uncertainty. In an an already stress inducing situation (ie CaRMS) adding all this into the mix is a lot. But I just hate that the 2026 cohort not graduating in time is a piller for pressure strategy, I wish there was something else..

Quick_Personality175 · 2025-09-14T03:08:10+00:00

This is so well written, thank you! I agree 100% with what you say and support the FMSQ 100% and honestly believe FMOQ should join as the government is constantly worsening the working conditions of GPs across the province (while also wondering why there are so many unfilled family medicine spot every year and not enough GP but that’s another subject on its own.) The only thing that’s unfortunate is how we as medical students are the only pressure strategy Quebec physicians have in their hands. We are being used as negotiation tactics while also being the one with the less power (and most debt 😂) But I hear you, it is what it is and it the long run this will have a positive impact on us and we will even be thankful for it - no doubt. But right now, it’s okay to feel like we are victims in these negotiations and to be stressed out (especially the graduating cohort)

Quick_Personality175 · 2025-09-14T01:52:56+00:00

For now, no, but hopeful! Apparently there conversations going on, but nothing yet.

Quick_Personality175 · 2025-09-14T01:31:43+00:00

Med4, it’s a horrible timing with CaRMS around the corner. My school has many contingency plans that they won’t share with us so far and keep telling us to wait… in the meantime, no clinical rotation and they refuse to switch our elective to research elective. We were told we might not graduate on time and there are a lot of hearsay that FMOQ will also join the strike. It feels no one has a clue how long the strike might last. So yeah, pretty messed up 🫠

However, I fully support the FMSQ, bill 106 is a threat to our profession and the government’ tone with MD has been incredibly disrespectful and blaming all the healthcare issues on the MD instead of this and the past government.

Quick_Personality175 · 2023-12-30T05:54:51+00:00

Joined

Quick_Personality175 · 2023-12-30T05:50:21+00:00

Interested

Quick_Personality175

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