Program Information
Resources
The University of Ottawa Internal Medicine Residency Training Program is a fully integrated program in cooperation with the three campuses of the university's teaching hospital: The Ottawa Hospital: General Campus (including the Ottawa Regional Cancer Centre) and the Civic Campus (including the University of Ottawa Heart Institute) and the Riverside Campus. The patient resources, available to support residents in their learning, are excellent in terms of volume, variety and complexity. The University of Ottawa offers three years of Internal Medicine as entry into a medicine subspecialty program or final year in General Internal Medicine.
Curriculum
The general medicine experience is provided on inpatient clinical teaching units (CTUs) led by general internists. Trainees complete rotations on the CTU in the PGY 1 year as a junior and then as a senior resident in the PGY2 year . As senior residents they supervise medical students and PGY1's from the basic clinical training program and the general medicine program. In the PGY3 year, residents are assigned to a consultation/triage rotation providing consultation in general medicine under the direction of a general internist to the inpatient services and emergency room on weekdays. Ambulatory care experience is obtained on the subspecialty rotations and on the ambulatory care rotation. Selectives are chosen from a variety of subspecialty rotation.
The program is designed to provide increasing responsibility to the trainee through all years. As a PGY1, the trainee is assigned to inpatient units under the supervision of a senior Resident and an attending physician. The senior resident role is provide by PGY 2 or PGY 3 resident. In the 3rd year, the resident also gains experience and responsibility by participating in the consultation/triage service and the ambulatory care rotation and a community rotation.
PGY-1
Internal Medicine - 16 weeks of general internal medicine, 4 weeks of cardiology, 4 weeks of ICU and 4 weeks of emergency medicine are mandatory. The remainder of the rotations is in any four of the following subspecialty rotations: neurology, nephrology, oncology, hematology. An additional four weeks in cardiology may be completed.
PGY-2 to 3
PGY-2 residents complete 20 weeks in general internal medicine as the ward resident on one of five CTUs, 16 weeks in a variety of subspecialty rotations (including rheumatology, respirology, ID, GI, endocrinology, geriatrics, and palliative care) and eight weeks either assigned to the CCU-Cardiology rotation or the Medical ICU. The PGY-3 year consists of 16 weeks of general internal medicine assigned to the general internal medicine consult triage service during the day in emergency and 24 weeks on subspecialty rotation. The other 8 weeks is either the CCU-Cardiology or ICU rotation (whichever was not completed during the PGY-2 year). PGY3 residents also complete an ambulatory block and a block of Community Internal Medicine. A total of 12 weeks of elective time is scheduled during the PGY2 and PGY3 year (community, external, or research).
Research
Residents are encouraged to participate in ongoing research. Faculty activities are collated in a binder for resident perusal. There is an expectation that residents in all years participate. A faculty champion in research has been identified. All residents will be expected to present at least one research project at the Department of Medicine's annual Research Day during their training.
Seminars
Ten to 15 hours per week are spent in educational seminars. Morning Report occurs daily for all PGY1, PGY-2 and PGY-3 residents assigned to the department of medicine. Noon subspecialty rounds, including medical grand rounds, occur daily at the General and Civic Campuses. Academic half-day sessions are held on Wednesday afternoons from September to June each academic year. Each trainee is evaluated by end-of-rotation assessments, (ITER), by an annual OSCE examination and by an annual ABIM exam.
Selection Criteria
PGY-1 residents are chosen on the basis of academic record, three reference letters, the Medical Student Performance Record, the personal letter and the interview. All applications will initially be reviewed and interviews offered based on the initial review of the CaRMS application.