Loading
Just a moment while this page opens.
Just a moment while this page opens.
Just a moment while this page opens.
Can you move to Canada as a doctor? Getting licensed, the immigration routes that fit this job, and your first steps, from official pages.
Yes, and part of the work can begin before you leave home. The Medical Council of Canada (MCC), the national body that runs the qualifying exam for doctors, says some steps may be completed outside Canada, and its exam, the MCCQE, is delivered in Canada and over 70 countries. Two different authorities then have to say yes. Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), the federal immigration department, decides whether you may immigrate, for example as a permanent resident (PR, allowed to live in Canada permanently). The medical regulator of the province or territory where you will work decides whether you may practise, and Job Bank, the federal jobs site, names these regulators by province. The two processes are separate: the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO) says meeting immigration requirements is not part of its application.
Canada sorts jobs with the National Occupational Classification (NOC). Immigration programs use it to identify your job and its TEER level, which says how much training the job usually needs.
TEER 1: jobs that usually need a university degree
Express Entry is the online system Canada uses to invite skilled workers to apply for permanent residence. Some of its rounds invite only people with recent work experience in a set group of jobs, called a category. This job is in:
In Canada, you need a licence to work in this job, from the regulator of the province or territory where you plan to work.
A national body for qualifications earned outside Canada: it assesses them or sets the entry exam for this job. The regulator in your province decides whether you go through it.
Each province and territory licenses doctors through its own medical regulatory authority, usually called a college, and the MCC advises checking the requirements of the one where you want to practise. Job Bank adds that family doctors need the qualifying examinations of the MCC or of the Collège des médecins du Québec, plus a licence from the provincial or territorial authority.
For international medical graduates (IMGs, doctors whose medical degree is from outside Canada and the United States), the MCC lists early steps that may apply:
For a full licence, most regulators then require some of the following: the Licentiate of the Medical Council of Canada (LMCC), a specialty certificate from the College of Family Physicians of Canada, the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada or the Collège des médecins du Québec, and registration with the regulator itself (MCC).
IRCC handles PR applications for its skilled worker programs through Express Entry, an online system for managing applications. Your profile is scored under IRCC's points system, the Comprehensive Ranking System (CRS), and IRCC invites the highest-ranking candidates who fit each round. Our Express Entry guide walks through each stage, and our CRS calculator gives an estimate of your points.
Some rounds are only for people with recent work in chosen jobs, and doctors appear on two of IRCC's lists. The healthcare list includes family doctors and specialists, and the 12 months of full-time work it asks for, within the past 3 years and in one listed job, can be in Canada or abroad. The physicians list covers the same doctor jobs but counts work done in Canada only. Experience gained abroad therefore counts toward the health rounds, not the physicians rounds. Our guide to category rounds explains how they work.
Provinces can also nominate people for PR, which our provincial nominee guide explains. These provincial routes name doctors:
Sometimes. Practice-Ready Assessment (PRA) programs, run by provinces, are for IMGs who have completed their residency and practised independently abroad. Instead of retraining, you work for about 12 weeks under the supervision of trained physician assessors, who judge whether you can give safe care in Canada (MCC). Most programs assess family medicine, and a few provinces assess other specialties. Each program sets its own entry rules, which may include exams; the MCC says some use the MCCQE to select applicants.
A PRA comes with a commitment. After a successful assessment, participants enter a return of service agreement to work in areas of high need in that province for a set period. Doctors from approved jurisdictions, whose training has been deemed substantially equivalent to Canadian training, may have a separate approved jurisdictions route, with requirements set by the certifying colleges named above.
Check your school first, because the MCC offers its services and exams only to people with an acceptable degree from an acceptable medical school. To sit the MCCQE, your school must be listed in the World Directory of Medical Schools with a Canada Sponsor Note saying it is acceptable in Canada, unless it is accredited in Canada or is an accredited US school of osteopathic medicine. Ontario's college applies its own rule to schools not accredited in Canada or the United States: the program must have included at least 130 weeks of instruction over at least 36 months, and the school must have been in the World Directory when you graduated.
Treating the MCCQE as a practice run. The MCC allows a maximum of 4 attempts, and an attempt counts as soon as you start the exam. After a third attempt, you must wait 1 year from receiving the result before you reapply for the fourth, and that wait cannot be shortened or waived. Because both residency and the LMCC depend on a pass, book the exam only when you are ready, and use the MCC's preparation resources first.
Answer our free questionnaire, which asks about your work, and get a free summary of your eligibility for every Canada pathway we assess. The full report is a later choice, never a condition.
Start the free questionnaire