Canadian Students at US Medical School

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Does anyone here know how easy or hard it is for a Canadian with a medical degree from a US school to work in the US or to work in Canada?

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I am 100% NOT an expert, so...

But as far as I've gleaned from a few web searches and various threads here over the years, the answer to that comes down to where you do residency and what your visa looks like. The school doesn't really matter in that equation, since US and Canadian schools are all LCME accredited. AFAIK, so long as your residency is ACGME accredited, in either country, then that is equivalent as well.
Technically speaking at least... that says nothing about visa requirements and hiring practices at any given institution. And whether you've taken the USMLEs or the MCCEEs, or both affects that as well.

And that's about as much as I know. Hopefully somebody else can chime in who knows more.
 
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Also not an expert, but I did briefly look into how the process works.

My understanding is it's fairly difficult to go through the Canadian match as a US grad, even as a Canadian citizen. This means it's probably easier to do residency in the States and then return to Canada (how easy this is depends on what province you're moving to and your specialty, but I know for family med its pretty straightforward). Canada recognizes the USMLE and COMLEX exams as acceptable licensure exams and so I believe you don't have to take any additional tests to practice there. The downside of that strategy is that depending on your visa status you may be limited in what US programs you can apply to.
 
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Current Canadian at a US school here. Can't speak much to working as an attending physician in that situation but I can offer some insight for residencies. This is just a quick overview, however, of what I know/understand so far.
As far as residency goes, going for a US residency is more likely the better option. Being in the US, you'll be taking and making all the examinations, rotations, and connections you need/want for your specialty and the NRMP match. But, the caveat is that if you are not a dual citizen or permanent resident, then you'll need to ask whichever programs you apply to for a work VISA since you are "applying for a job" as a resident. That part is tricky because some programs do not offer them, some do not mention it unless you ask, and some might rather take a US citizen over the paper work that comes with you (this last point is just speculation from me, haven't seen any actual evidence of this). It's also a little complicated by the fact that there are 2 VISA options: H1B and J1. The former is much better for working/living the US and though the latter is not terrible, you'll have a 2-year requirement to either return home or work in an under-served area after training. The upside is that Canada recently took away their J-1 limitations; before, they only offered a certain number of J-1 VISAs for certain specialties to Canadians abroad in order to meet Canada's quota for that specialty.

That said, the US is still likely a better option than going for the Canadian match depending on your specialty of choice. If you want something competitive, it's best to aim for the US, otherwise Canada could be another option as viable as the US. To make yourself competitive for Canada, you can do some away rotations at institutes in Canada and establish yourself there. Otherwise, you'll just apply for CaRMs and NRMP simultaneously in 4th year. Just know that the Canadian match results come out first and if you match with CaRMs, the NRMP will be notified and you'll be pulled out of the US match process; there's no picking between the two! I do know of one person who did his interviews in both Canada and the US for neurosurgery and in the end, did not rank any Canadian schools and matched in the US instead.
 
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Thanks for the insight everyone. I was accepted into a fairly well respected US MD program and it would be at least one year maybe more until I could get into a Canadian school. Haha now I have to start making the big decisions
 
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