Hello,
I was wondering if med schools in Canada was cheaper than those in the US. If so, if one were to study medicine there will they be able to work in the U.S. without a problem?
Yes, Canadian medical schools are less expensive than private and OOS public US med schools. (It’s a toss-up when it comes to in-state public med schools.)
Graduates of Canadian med schools may enter the US residency match so long as they have taken the USMLEs. (Canadian med students take a different standardized exam, the MCCQE, to enter the Canadian match.)
But there’s a few huge problems with planning on attending a Canadian school:
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Most of the Canadian medical schools will only consider legal residents of the province where the school is located. Only 7-8 Canadian schools will consider international applicants and US citizens are internationals for admission purposes. Three of those have French as the primary language of instruction.
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Because there are fewer med schools per capita in Canada than in the US, the competition for admission is very high. The average GPAs for admitted students are typically in the 3.8-4.0 range.
(Truthfully, many Canadian pre-meds apply to US med schools because they can’t get accepted in Canada due to provincial quotas and GPA requirements.) -
There is no financial aid for US students. You must be able to arrange your own private loans to attend should you get accepted.
Do any of the canadian schools do what some US schools require for internationals? Front the 4 years of tuition in an escrow account?
I can’t find that information on their admission websites (probably because so few internationals are admitted).
I did discover that McMaster University has a **$95,000/year tuition surcharge for international students. And that UT has a $66,00/year tuition surcharge for internationals./b
So maybe, attending a Canadian med school isn’t a bargain after all.
Thank you so much! That was very helpful!!!