Community Health
(Community Medicine)

THE RESIDENCY PROGRAM
The McGill residency program in community medicine trains specialists to identify health problems in populations; to plan, implement, and evaluate programs to promote health and control disease; and to apply this knowledge to community-oriented clinical practice. The performance of the tasks specific to community medicine requires the development of knowledge in several academic fields (epidemiology, statistics, administration, and economics) and skills in different fields of practice such as clinical preventive medicine, health care policy, health services organization, health promotion, infectious disease, and occupational and environmental health.

The McGill Community Medicine Program has three principal components:

1-Clinical training in family medicine This is done under the aegis of the Department of Family Medicine in one of their approved training sites in Montreal ( CLSC Cote-des-Neiges, Sir Mortimer B. Davis Jewish General Hospital , St. Mary’s Hospital) or in Gatineau , Québec. All residents do at least one full year of this training. They have the same duties and privileges as first year residents in Family Medicine during this period, and follow an equivalent course of study. A 4-week rural rotation in Family Medicine is encouraged in the first year and are available in Buckingham, Chisasibi, Cowansville, Gatineau , Maniwaki, Ormstown, Purvirnituq, Shawville, Temiscaming, Val D’Or , Valleyfield , and Wakefield . Family Medicine rotations are also tailored to focus on the needs of Community Medicine specialists. For example, elective rotations in Adolescent Medicine, HIV/STD & Infectious Diseases, Occupational Health, Tropical Medicine and others are encouraged.

Residents who wish more clinical training may take up to one more full year. They may chose to complete the requirements for Family Medicine certification with the approval of the Family Medicine Residency Program . Others may decide to do further clinical training in an area they want to work in as a Community Medicine Specialist (eg: TB, HIV, travel medicine, occupational health, etc...). This further clinical training may be either interspersed with the academic work of the Master’s program (see below) and the field placements, or taken as larger blocks after academic training is complete.

 2-Master’s degree in Epidemiology and Biostatistics and Occupational Health at McGill University www.mcgill.ca/epi-biostat:
Depending on the academic program chosen by the resident, this component lasts between three and four university terms, starting in September of the second year of residency and ending in January or April of the third year as a full time activity. The Master’s degree can be done in either a thesis or a non-thesis program. Completing the thesis, for those residents who choose this stream, usually continues on a part time basis for another term.

The Joint Departments of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and Occupational Health offer a wide variety of public health related courses such as Molecular Methods for Infectious Diseases; Social Epidemiology & Population Health; Health Care Systems in Comparative Perspective. Training electives are also available in Health Promotion, Program Evaluation, and other relevant issues.

3-Field placements in Community Health
These placements provide the core of practical training in public health practice, and are mostly done in Montreal ‘s Regional Public Health Department, our principal teaching site. With an urban population of 1.8 million, the Montreal health region presents all the challenges of modern public health practice: empowering communities and neighbourhoods, dealing with poverty and under education, communicating with different ethnic communities effectively, reducing the harm from needle drug use, sexually transmitted disease and HIV, delivering basic public health programs such as vaccination, mother and child care, and school health on a large scale, and measuring the impact of rapid change in the health care sector.

Moving through the mandatory field placements over a period of two years allows each resident to gain a working knowledge of the programs and projects in each of the department’s units, and to practice, under close supervision, the public health tasks of community diagnosis, program planning, implementation, and evaluation. In each unit, the resident becomes an integral member of the team and is involved in one or more projects. Each resident also has the opportunity to deepen their involvement with a particular field of practice, by returning to that placement in their final year for more experience.

For senior residents, placements are also available with several other Regional Public Health Departments in Quebec : the Montérégie region (south shore of Montreal ), the Outaouais region (north of Ottawa ), the Laval region (north shore of Montreal ) and the Cree Territory in James Bay . These placements expose the resident to semi-urban, rural and aboriginal health issues. Additional placements are possible with the Ministry of Health and Social Services as well as with a health technology assessment agency. Placements in international setting are also encouraged.

A working knowledge of French (speaking and reading) is necessary for all field placements, as health departments in Quebec function entirely in French. We have found that residents who have completed high school French anywhere in Canada usually have no problems acquiring the necessary language skills by their third year in Montreal , when field placements begin. During the field placements at Montreal’s Regional Public Health Department, residents are provided with desks (in the residents’ office), computers, telephones, fax access.

Content and Sequence of Rotations

 All residents must do a master’s project or thesis, as previously described.

Candidates are accepted at the PGY-1 level via CaRMS.

For more information or application forms, please contact:

Dr. Joseph Cox
Program Director
Residency Program in Community Medicine
Montreal Public Health Department
1301 Sherbrooke East
Montreal, Quebec H2L 1M3

Natalie Buddo, Program Coordinator
Community Medicine Residency Program
McGill University
1020 Pine Ave West, Montreal, QC H3A 1A2
Tel.: (514) 398-2628
Fax: (514) 398-4503
E-mail: coordcmrp.eboh@mcgill.ca
 

Visit the Montreal-Centre Regional Public Health Department's website
http://www.santepub-mtl.qc.ca for an idea of the projects and programmes in our principal teaching site.

Revised: 03/2011