US med school to Montreal (Quebec)?

[Fed Meat]

My girlfriend is French and is in school and McGill now (and will be for awhile). I'm just about to start at a US med school. Both of us would prefer to live in the US, but I thought I'd at least explore the possibility of living in Quebec.

1) As a US med school graduate, I understand that I'd be at a slight disadvantage to enter the Canadian match, correct? Would I be limited in my match programs?

2) If I went through a US residency program, assuming the program was of equal length to the Canadian residency, all I'd have to do is pass the board exams, right? And if the Canadian program was longer, I'd have to compete against thousands of other applicants for an unpaid residency?

Would certain residencies be preferable to others?

Also, what would be the possibility of my being able to return to the States from either of these two tracks to practice in the States? Probably pretty good for option 2. For option 1, could I as a US citizen just return to practice in the States? My guess is no.

I'm not a huge fan of incurring US debt and venturing into lower paying and higher taxed Canada, so yes, finances are something I'm going to be paying attention to.

Even if you have any general pointers that might begin to direct me towards my answers, that would help.

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[jbish]

In regards to 2)...you can do a few things to extend the length of a US residency to make it equal to a Canadian one without having to compete for an unpaid residency spot. For example, if you do Ob/Gyn in the US it is 4 years, but 5 in Canada. So, for a fifth year, you could be chief resident. This extends your residency to 5 years and you get paid. Or you could do a fellowship that would extend your training to the right length. Or perhaps add a research year to an otherwise normal residency.