US Rheumatologist looking to relocate to Canada

[mabdu]

Hello all,

I am an IMG; I have done by internal medicine residency and rheumatology fellowship in the US and am currently in my first year as a licensed practising rheumatologist. I was hoping to get some information about the possibility of relocating and practising in Canada. I do have some family in Ontario which is where I would aim to eventually practise. I went online and it seems if I did apply for immigration / permanent residency, there is a good chance that I would succeed. I do however want to know about how I would be able to practise; specifically
1. Would I need to take further exams ?
2. There is mention of working with a mentor / supervisor; would that apply to me although I am board certified and licensed for the specialty in the US ?
3. any further advise / infor that may be useful

Thank you in advance for any help / guidance that you all may be able to provide.

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[NewCanadian]

contact www.healthforceontario.ca. they will help you understand the whole process.

 

[Old_Mil]

Hi Mabdu,

I'll second the recommendation to contact Health Force Ontario, they will be able to point you in the right direction as far as jobs and licensing if nothing else. I'm about 6 months into the process. Some of the things I needed:

1. A hospital willing to work with a "supervision" agreement for a period of time so I could apply for an Ontario license under their Pathway 3 since our EM residencies are chronologically shorter than those in Canada. I believe that IM and FM residencies are of equal lengths in the US and Canada so you may not need to use this method of licensing.

2. My medical degree needed to be source verified by the Medical Council of Canada and educational credential assessment - basically a certificate of equivalence - must be issued. This can a few months and if you're an IMG who hails from a non-North American medical school it will probably take more than that.

3. A Labor Market Impact Assessment prepared by the hospital I will be working at that ensures my arrival won't disadvantage a Canadian citizen who wants to work there.

4. You'll need to take and pass the General IELTS (a test of english fluency with reading, writing, and conversational components). These are offered at a limited number of test centers and have fewer test dates than the various medical exams we take online at Pearson.

5. Once all this is done, you can apply to emigrate online at cic.gov through the express entry system.

You will likely have the same job code as I do (3111) which probably means that you will have to have all three of the items above (ECA, IELTS, and LMIA) in hand before you submit an express entry application.

My understanding is that it will take another 6 months after my express entry application is successfully submitted to have an immigration decision from the CIC. So start to finish the process will probably take a year in my case. I'm actually going to be the third American on staff at this particular hospital should everything go as planned. I think with all the changes south of the border the trend of 3 or 4 decades ago may reverse itself somewhat.

 

[mabdu]

Thank you OldMil for the details. How far along have you come in the process. I will likely need to apply for licensure to CPSO via pathway 3/4 as IM training I believe is longer in Canada. I will be verifying this though. In addition there will be no requirement to take exams though. You did list a few different steps and if you could list in chronological order of how to proceed that would be great. Address / apply for immigration first or also try to obtain job offer. Reportedly if one has a job offer then there is need to assess the job market as you listed; I am not sure if I could apply without a job offer ?

One thing that bothers me is what happens if a few years from now the CPSO changes policy and the fact that one is not eligible to take Canadian exams becomes a problem. One would have to relocate back to USA?