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Niagara - General Surgery

McMaster UniversityNiagara, OntarioCMG stream

At a glance

Approx. quota
1 position
Length
5 years
Applications per year
51–200
Offered interviews
0–25%

CMG stream · open to Canadian medical graduates

Town hall

all 3 info sessions of this program

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

Interviews

2 dates, 21–22 Jan 2027virtual

Niagara, 7 teaching sites

Program website(opens in a new tab)Instagram(opens in a new tab)X(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

  • Single-resident-per-year general surgery stream based mainly in a community hospital, not a tertiary centre.

    From “Important information” on the CaRMS page

  • Residents design their PGY3/4 rotation schedule with the Regional Education Lead around their career goals.

    From “Program curriculum” on the CaRMS page

  • The Niagara General Surgery program is a direct-entry branch of McMaster's General Surgery program, with most clinical training at a community site.
  • It matches one resident per year, and Niagara Health - Marotta Family Hospital is the main teaching site.
  • The program lasts 5 years, includes rotations in Hamilton such as pediatric surgery, and requires at least two research projects.

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

Based on what the program says about itself.

  • You’re open to training at sites across a region, not at one hospital.
    Show the quote

    The Niagara General Surgery residency program is a direct entry branch of the Primary McMaster General Surgery Program.

Not a ranking.

What training looks like

Setting
  • Regional community
  • Academic / tertiary hospital
Rural exposure
Not stated on CaRMS page
Focus areas
  • Small program
Research
Required · research or quality-improvement project · protected time

By year

PGY-1
  • General SurgeryNiagara8 Blocks
  • Pediatric SurgeryMcMaster Children's Hospital2 Blocks
  • Rookie Camp1 Block
  • Internal MedicineNiagara1 Block
  • Selective (ER or Internal Medicine)Niagara1 Block
PGY-2
  • General SurgeryNiagara5 Blocks
  • ICUNiagara3 Blocks
  • EndoscopyNiagara3 Blocks
  • General Surgery/TraumaHamilton General Surgery2 Blocks
PGY-3
  • General Surgery with elective time and exposure to subspecialty rotationsVariable blocks
PGY-4
  • Chief ResidencyNiagara and Hamilton14 Blocks
  • Transition to Practice2 Blocks

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

Where you train

Niagara, Ontario: 7 teaching sites.

  • Niagara Health - Marotta Family Hospital
  • Welland Hospital (Welland)
  • Greater Niagara Hospital
  • The McMaster site, Hamilton Health Sciences (Hamilton)
  • The General site, Hamilton Health Sciences (Hamilton)
  • The Juravinski site of the Hamilton Health Sciences (Hamilton)
  • St. Joseph's Hospital (Hamilton)

Distributed across a region

Record systems at the listed sites: Epic at 3 of 7, Oracle Health (Cerner) at 2; no published record for 2.

Hospital facts

5 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 The McMaster site, Hamilton Health Sciences, The General site, Hamilton Health Sciences, The Juravinski site of the Hamilton Health Sciences.

Niagara Health - Marotta Family Hospital

Clinical record
Oracle Cerner (Cerner hospital information system), fully electronic record As of 31 Oct 2026

St. Joseph's Hospital

Clinical record
Cerner (OneChart), 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 St. Catharines

  • People

    136,803residents, 2021 Census

    Municipality of St. Catharines

  • Housing

    3.8%rental vacancy rate

    October 2025 survey, St

  • Winter and summer

    −3.3 °CJanuary mean22.2 °CJuly mean

    1991–2020 normals, Vineland, 12.1 km away

  • Job outlook

    Goodfor the specialty here, 2025–2027

More about St. Catharines (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)
21 and 22 Jan 2027
Format
Virtual
  • Panel

Info sessions

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 stream15 years2 dates, 21–22 Jan 2027VirtualNothing noted

2026 match

The 2026 match, one row per stream (scrolls sideways on narrow screens)
StreamPositionsLengthInterviews
CMG stream15 years2 dates, 22–23 Jan 2026
The 2026 page of the CMG stream: our summary of its CaRMS description
  • The Niagara General Surgery residency program is a direct entry branch of the Primary McMaster General Surgery Program.
  • This unique program offers the opportunity to complete the majority of clinical training in a community hospital site while maintaining a strong academic connection with the larger McMaster program.
  • Residents benefit from a close-knit environment with five residents and eight primary faculty, providing exceptional learning opportunities in the Niagara Region.
Research
Residents are expected to complete a minimum of two quality research projects over five years, with support from departmental research staff and local research coordinators.
Training setting
Training occurs primarily at St. Catharines General Hospital, a modern community hospital, with additional rotations at Hamilton Health Sciences sites including McMaster Children's Hospital, Hamilton General Hospital, Juravinski Hospital, and St. Joseph's Hospital.
Teaching approach
A competency-based medical education approach focused on resident learning, progressive independence, and preparing residents for individual practice through personalized rotation schedules and comprehensive surgical exposure.
Enhanced skills
Not stated on CaRMS page
What the program looked at
  • CV content
  • Clinical elective evaluations
  • Volunteering experience
  • Leadership skills
  • Medical Student Performance Record (MSPR)
  • Personal letter
  • Reference documents
  • Research/publications
  • Academic transcripts

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

Program Coordinator- Niagara, Program Coordinator, McMaster

Write to the officemacaulak@mcmaster.ca

Per CaRMS. Staff change during the cycle, so check the CaRMS program page(opens in a new tab) before emailing. Site staff and other contacts are listed there too.

Program websiteWebsiteInstagramXCANPREPPCANPREPPNiagara Regional Health System(opens in a new tab)This 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 Niagara

  • Hamilton - General SurgeryMcMaster University

    Hamilton · 66 km

    6 positions · CMG

  • Toronto - General SurgeryUniversity of Toronto

    Toronto · 67 km

    16 positions · CMG, IMG

  • Peel & Surrounding Communities - General SurgeryToronto Metropolitan University

    Peel & Surrounding Communities · 72 km

    2 positions · CMG, IMG

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 36388 · 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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