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Hamilton - General Surgery

McMaster UniversityHamilton, OntarioCMG stream

At a glance

Approx. quota
6 positions
Length
5 years
Applications per year
51–200
Offered interviews
26–50%

CMG stream · open to Canadian medical graduates

Town hall

all 2 info sessions of this program

Tue 10 Nov 2026,7:00–8:30 pm ESTvia CANPREPP source (opens in a new tab)

Interviews

1 date, 22 Jan 2027virtual

Hamilton, 13 teaching sites

Program website(opens in a new tab)Instagram(opens in a new tab)CANPREPP profile(opens in a new tab)CaRMS program page(opens in a new tab)

What stands out about this program

  • Divisional endowment (Juravinski Surgical Fellowship) can fund salary support for a research leave of absence.

    From “Additional information” on the CaRMS page

  • Program-specific "Rookie Camp" of educational sessions added to the Surgical Foundations Boot Camp in year one.

    From “Program curriculum” on the CaRMS page

  • McMaster's General Surgery program is a five-year residency whose first year overlaps with Surgical Foundations.
  • Training is centred at St. Joseph's, Hamilton General and Juravinski hospitals in Hamilton, with up to 6 blocks of community or elective surgery outside Hamilton.
  • Residents must complete two research projects and may request research blocks in PGY3-4.

The summary is written by CdnMD from the program’s CaRMS description.

What training looks like

Setting
  • Academic / tertiary hospital
Rural exposure
Not stated on CaRMS page
Research
Required · research project · protected time

By year

Not stated on CaRMS page

Other rotations

Listed by the program without a single PGY year.

  • Surgical Foundations Boot Camp plus our program-specific "Rookie Camp" of educational sessions (YEAR ONE · 1 block)
  • Trauma (YEAR ONE · 1 block)
  • Acute Care Surgery (YEAR ONE · 1 block · HGH)
  • non-ACS general surgery (YEAR ONE · 6 blocks · SJH and JHCC)
  • pediatric general surgery (YEAR ONE · 2 blocks)
  • internal medicine or perioperative medicine (YEAR ONE · 1 block)
  • emergency medicine OR internal medicine OR perioperative medicine OR thoracic surgery (YEAR ONE · 1 block)
  • acute care surgery (YEAR TWO · 3 blocks · SJH or JHCC)
  • non-ACS general surgery (YEAR TWO · 2 blocks · HGH)
  • non-ACS general surgery (YEAR TWO · 2 blocks · anywhere in Hamilton)
  • ICU (YEAR TWO · 3 blocks)
  • Endoscopy (YEAR TWO · 3 blocks)
  • community or elective general surgery (YEAR THREE + FIRST 10 BLOCKS OF YEAR FOUR · Up to 6 blocks · outside Hamilton)
  • non-general surgery surgical specialty (e.g., Vascular, Thoracic, Head and Neck, Urology, Plastics) (YEAR THREE + FIRST 10 BLOCKS OF YEAR FOUR · Up to 4 blocks)
  • breast oncology (YEAR THREE + FIRST 10 BLOCKS OF YEAR FOUR · 2 blocks)
  • acute care surgery (YEAR THREE + FIRST 10 BLOCKS OF YEAR FOUR · 3 blocks · SJH or JHCC)
  • acute care surgery (YEAR THREE + FIRST 10 BLOCKS OF YEAR FOUR · 1 block · HGH)
  • Trauma (YEAR THREE + FIRST 10 BLOCKS OF YEAR FOUR · 1 block)
  • general surgery (YEAR THREE + FIRST 10 BLOCKS OF YEAR FOUR · 4 to 6 blocks · anywhere in Hamilton)
  • non-general surgery elective blocks, e.g., research, global health, non-surgical rotations (YEAR THREE + FIRST 10 BLOCKS OF YEAR FOUR · Up to 3 blocks)
  • general surgery (LAST 3 Blocks of year four + YEAR FIVE – THE “CHIEF YEAR” · 14 blocks)
  • “transition to practice” clinical experiences (LAST 3 Blocks of year four + YEAR FIVE – THE “CHIEF YEAR” · 2 blocks)

✓ = the CaRMS page states it; – = not stated. From the program description and its rotation list.

Where you train

Hamilton, Ontario: 13 teaching sites.

  • St. Joseph’s Hospital
  • Hamilton General Hospital
  • Juravinski Hospital and Cancer Centre
  • Oakville (Oakville)
  • Joseph Brant in Burlington (Burlington)
  • Brantford (Brantford)
  • Markham-Stouffville (Markham)
  • MacKenzie Health
  • Kitchener-Waterloo (Kitchener)
  • Cambridge (Cambridge)
  • Guelph (Guelph)
  • Collingwood (Collingwood)
Show all 13 sites
  • Credit Valley

Record systems at the listed sites: Epic at 3 of 13, MEDITECH at 4, Oracle Health (Cerner) at 2; no published record for 4.

Moving to a new system: Cambridge.

Hospital facts

9 sites · clinical record systems where an official source states them

What official sources say for hospitals named above, each with its source and the date we read it. They describe the hospital, not the program. We match names to the sources by name, so check each source before you rely on it.

Clinical record
Epic, fully electronic record since Jun 2022 As of 31 Oct 2026. At Hamilton General Hospital, Juravinski Hospital and Cancer Centre.

St. Joseph’s Hospital

Clinical record
Cerner (OneChart), system named (how far it goes is not stated) As of 31 Oct 2026

Oakville

Clinical record
MEDITECH Expanse, fully electronic record since Nov 2021 As of 31 Oct 2026

Brantford

Clinical record
MEDITECH (cloud-based EHR), system named (how far it goes is not stated) As of 31 Oct 2026
Show facts for 4 more sites

Markham-Stouffville

Clinical record
MEDITECH Expanse, fully electronic record As of 31 Oct 2026

Cambridge

Clinical record
Oracle Health Foundation, moving to a new system As of 31 Oct 2026

Collingwood

Clinical record
MEDITECH Expanse (CARE4 shared record), system named (how far it goes is not stated) As of 31 Oct 2026

Credit Valley

Clinical record
Epic, system named (how far it goes is not stated) As of 31 Oct 2026

Verify with the official source: each source button opens the publisher’s own page.

Hospital size and activity: Ontario doesn't publish this as open data.

About Hamilton

  • People

    569,353residents, 2021 Census

    Municipality of Hamilton

  • Housing

    3.5%rental vacancy rate

    October 2025 survey, Hamilton, Ontario (census metropolitan area)

  • Winter and summer

    −3.1 °CJanuary mean21.9 °CJuly mean

    1991–2020 normals, Burlington Piers, 5.0 km away

  • Job outlook

    Goodfor the specialty here, 2025–2027

More about Hamilton (its page: housing, getting around, weather, things to do, and every program that names it)

Sites as the program’s CaRMS page lists them. City figures are public statistics for the place named by the location; they describe the place, not the program.

How they choose

Application file components
  • CV
  • Electives
  • Examinations
  • Extra-curricular
  • Leadership skills
  • MSPRs
  • Personal letters
  • Reference documents
  • Research/Publications
  • Transcripts
Return of service
Not stated on CaRMS page. Check the provincial return-of-service rules.

Application file components as the program describes them.

Interviews and info sessions

Interview dates (2027 match)
22 Jan 2027
Format
Virtual
  • Panel

Info sessions

  • Tue 10 Nov 2026

    7:00–8:30 pm EST

    Town hall · VirtualCANPREPP source (opens in a new tab)

  • Thu 21 Jan 2027

    time not stated

    Meet and greet · Listed under interviews on CaRMS

From the program’s CaRMS page (opens in a new tab), read 20 Oct 2026; a row tagged CANPREPP is on CANPREPP’s events calendar (read 24 Oct 2026), alone or as well. Dates and times are as the program wrote them; “your time” is worked out in your browser when your time zone differs. Programs add and change sessions.

Pay and call

Provincial scale, last updated 6 Jan 2025 · check the current agreement(opens in a new tab). Contract expired, may change. One provincial scale for Ontario, set by the resident agreement, so every program there pays the same. Showing the 5 levels this program covers.

Annual salary by PGY level, Ontario
LevelAnnual salary
PGY-1
$73,367 / year
PGY-2
$79,670 / year
PGY-3
$85,564 / year
PGY-4
$92,701 / year
PGY-5
$98,567 / year

How provincial pay and rent compare

Call

Call (provincial max)
7 nights in 28 in-house
Post-call rule (provincial)
No new patient responsibilities after 24 hours in-hospital, except what clinical handover needs
Max continuous duty (provincial)
24 hours in-hospital, then relieved after handover (up to 2 hours)

The union agreement’s limits and rules for all residents in the province; your program’s actual call schedule may be lighter. PARO agreement, 1 Jul 2023 to 30 Jun 2026. The term has ended; its terms continue until a new agreement is signed. Read as of 1 Oct 2026.

Past matches

No repeated vacancies in CaRMS’s lists of open positions, 2019–2026.

Positions at this site, all streams.

What this means

  • A position can go unfilled because of where the site is, because it is open to IMGs only or to another restricted stream, or because the quota changed late.
  • It says nothing about the quality of the training or how heavy the workload is.
  • A site’s numbers are shown when it had positions open after round 1 in at least 2 of 8 years or at least 3 in one year.

Source: CaRMS’s lists of positions open after round 1 and after round 2, as read in October 2026 (latest: 2026 round 1 (CaRMS PDF, opens in a new tab), 2026 round 2 (CaRMS PDF, opens in a new tab)).

Year by year

2027 match

The 2027 match, one row per stream (scrolls sideways on narrow screens)
StreamPositionsLengthInterviewsWhat changed
CMG stream65 years1 date, 22 Jan 2027VirtualNothing noted

2026 match

The 2026 match, one row per stream (scrolls sideways on narrow screens)
StreamPositionsLengthInterviews
CMG stream65 years2 dates, 22–23 Jan 2026
The 2026 page of the CMG stream: our summary of its CaRMS description
  • McMaster University's General Surgery Residency is a comprehensive 5-year program designed to train highly skilled and adaptable surgeons.
  • The program offers flexible training across diverse clinical settings, preparing residents for a wide range of surgical careers from rural hospitals to academic medical centers.
Research
Residents are required to complete two research projects, with opportunities to pursue Masters or PhD degrees, including potential funded positions through the Clinician Investigator Program.
Training setting
Training occurs across multiple urban hospitals in Hamilton, Ontario, including St. Joseph's Hospital, Hamilton General Hospital, and Juravinski Hospital and Cancer Centre, with additional rotations in community hospitals.
Teaching approach
A collaborative, competency-based approach emphasizing progressive independence, continuous improvement, and personalized learning through work-based assessments and structured academic curriculum.
Enhanced skills
Not stated on CaRMS page
What the program looked at
  • CV
  • Personal letter
  • Letters of reference
  • Academic record
  • Interviews
  • Electives exploration

Positions, length and interviews as each match’s CaRMS pages stated them; what changed from our comparison of the two matches and our readings of the 2027 pages.

Contacts and links

Program director
Program office

Per CaRMS. Staff change during the cycle, so check the CaRMS program page(opens in a new tab) before emailing.

Program websiteWebsiteInstagramCANPREPPCANPREPPThis program on CaRMS(opens in a new tab)

Videos and podcasts

From the program

Public podcast episodes and videos where the program presents itself. The short descriptions are ours; each link goes to the original.

These are public recordings, reviewed by hand and linked here, not endorsed. They may be out of date. Confirm with the program.

All videos, podcasts and discussions →

General Surgery elsewhere

Nearest to Hamilton

  • Peel & Surrounding Communities - General SurgeryToronto Metropolitan University

    Peel & Surrounding Communities · 41 km

    2 positions · CMG, IMG

  • Toronto - General SurgeryUniversity of Toronto

    Toronto · 59 km

    16 positions · CMG, IMG

  • Niagara - General SurgeryMcMaster University

    Niagara · 66 km

    1 position · CMG

Source

The program’s CaRMS page (opens in a new tab) · 2027 match · last approved 28 Aug 2026 · not final until file review opens 26 November; as of 19 Oct 2026, re-checked every two weeks.

Accredited · CaRMS program ID 36515 · How these pages are made › · See the 2026 match under Year by year

The Applications per year and Offered interviews figures are 5-year averages the program reports to CaRMS: past cycles, not your odds.

Independent. Not affiliated with CaRMS or the program. Programs edit their descriptions during the match; confirm on carms.ca (opens in a new tab) before you apply. Data last updated on CdnMD 24 Oct 2026.

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