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Kitchener-Waterloo - Family Medicine - Addiction Medicine

McMaster UniversityKitchener-Waterloo, OntarioCompetitive stream

Enhanced skills (FM/ES) match

Family medicine residents applying for a PGY-3 year (the "+1").

Contacts and 1 more link
Open on carms.ca(opens in a new tab)

CaRMS program description, FM/ES 2027 match, last approved 28 Jul 2026

Positions (approx. quota)
Not stated on CaRMS page
Length
1 year
Stream
Competitive
Discipline
Family Medicine - Addiction Medicine
Applications per year
0–50
Applicants offered interviews
76–100%
Accreditation
Accredited
CaRMS program ID
34634

Bands are 5-year averages the program reports to CaRMS. They describe past cycles, not your odds.

Summary

  • It is based at McMaster's Waterloo Regional Campus, with training at Homewood Health Centre in Guelph and hospital services in Kitchener and Hamilton.
  • Rotations include medical detox, consult service, opioid agonist clinic, residential treatment, street outreach, acute psychiatry and pain management, plus a weekly family medicine clinic half day.

Training

Setting
  • Urban community
  • Academic / tertiary hospital
Sites

4 teaching sites

  • McMaster’s Waterloo Regional Campus
  • Homewood Health Centre
  • Grand River Hospital
Show all 4
  • St. Joseph’s Hospital

Distributed across a region

Rural exposure
Not stated on CaRMS page
Focus areas
  • family_practice_continuity
Research
Protected time
Highlights
  • Emphasis on treating concurrent psychiatric disorders, including acute psychiatry and residential concurrent-disorder treatment.
  • Required street outreach rotation combining addictions and primary care.
  • Interview panel may include a person with lived experience.

By year

Not stated on CaRMS page

Other rotations

Listed by the program without a single year.

  • Medical Detox (inpatient)
  • Rapid Access Addiction Medicine Clinic (outpatient)
  • Hospital Consult Service (inpatient)
  • Opioid Agonist Clinic (outpatient)
  • Residential Treatment, including Concurrent Mood/Anxiety/Trauma Disorders (inpatient)
  • Street Outreach- Addictions & Primary Care (outpatient)
  • Acute Psychiatry, including substance-induced psychosis (inpatient)
  • Pain Management (inpatient & outpatient)
  • Selective block with relevance for addictions medicine, e.g., infectious disease, public health, psychiatry, psychotherapy, hepatology, perinatal addiction medicine, pediatric/youth addiction medicine
  • Scholarship/advocacy/policy block

Selection

Application file components
  • CV
  • Electives
  • Examinations
  • Extra-curricular
  • Leadership skills
  • MSPRs
  • Personal letters
  • Reference documents
  • Research/Publications
  • Transcripts
Return of service
Required · IMGs only
Applications per year
0–50
Applicants offered interviews
76–100%

Interviews

Dates (FM/ES 2027 match)
5, 7 and 8 Nov 2026
Mode
Virtual
Format
  • Panel

Programs can change interview dates. Confirm on carms.ca.

Pay

Provincial scale, last updated 6 Jan 2025 · check the current agreement(opens in a new tab)

Contract expired, may change.

Annual salary by PGY level, Ontario
LevelAnnual salary
PGY-3
$85,564 / year

One provincial scale for Ontario, set by the resident agreement, so every program there pays the same. Showing PGY-3, the level FM/ES residents usually start at. Yours depends on your training so far.

Call

Call (provincial max)
7 nights in 28 in-house

The union agreement’s cap for all residents in the province; your program’s actual call schedule may be lighter. Check with the program.

PARO agreement, 1 Jul 2023 to 30 Jun 2026. The term has ended; its terms continue until a new agreement is signed.

Teaching sites

  • McMaster’s Waterloo Regional Campus (Waterloo)
  • Homewood Health Centre (Guelph)
  • Grand River Hospital (Kitchener)
  • St. Joseph’s Hospital (Hamilton)

Hospital facts

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

Contacts

Grouped by the titles CaRMS lists. The program office (administrators and coordinators) usually answers questions about the program and applying; the director leads the training.

Program director

  • Dr. Joel Schmidt

CaRMS lists no email for the director.

Other contacts

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

More links

Links the program published on CaRMS

Location

Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario

Loading amenities…

About the city

Public statistics for the place named by this program’s location label, each with its source and reference period. They describe the place, not the program, and are not a ranking. Check each source before you rely on it. This label covers more than one place, so each is listed on its own (A to Z); open one to read it.

Kitchener

Climate

Canadian Climate Normals, 1991–2020. Each value comes from the nearest weather station that reports it, not from the city itself.

January average
−6.3 °C Kitchener/Waterloo, 5.1 km away
July average
20.2 °C Kitchener/Waterloo, 5.1 km away
Snowfall
114.5 cm a year Toronto Pearson (Airport), 70.7 km away (more than 50 km, so it may differ from the city)
Days below −20 °C
6.5 days a year Kitchener/Waterloo, 5.1 km away

People

2021 Census. Figures are for the municipality of Kitchener, not the metropolitan area. Statistics Canada rounds counts, so small places are approximate.

Population
256,885 people up 10.1% from 2016
Official languages
English only 91.5% · French only 0.0% · English and French 6.2% · neither 2.3% Share of residents who can conduct a conversation in each. This is not the language spoken at home.
Immigrants
29.7% of residents arrived 2016–2021: 6.4% · non-permanent residents: 3.7%
Indigenous identity
1.9% of residents
How people commute
car, truck or van 88.5% · public transit 5.7% · walking or cycling 3.8% · other 2.0% Average commute: 22.3 minutes. Shares are of people who commute.The way Canadians commute was altered in 2021 by the pandemic, with lockdowns to slow the spread of COVID-19 and changes in how and where Canadians worked leading to 2.8 million fewer commuters, compared with five years earlier. Statistics Canada, The Daily, 30 Nov 2022(opens in a new tab)
Median household income
$87,000 before tax $76,500 after tax · income year 2020, in 2020 dollars

Rural and remote

This describes the place named by the program’s location label. Programs can train in several towns, so it is not every site.

Population centre
Kitchener, a large urban population centre (100,000 or more people) 522,888 people in 2021
Remoteness index
0.078 0 is least remote, 1 is most remote. Statistics Canada calls this index experimental.

Housing, cost and work

Each figure names the area it covers. A missing line means the source publishes nothing for this area.

Rental vacancy rate
4.0% October 2025 survey, Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo, Ontario (census metropolitan area). The share of purpose-built rentals (three units and over) vacant, not a rent.
Basic cost of living
$55,434 a year Market Basket Measure 2025, Ontario, population 500,000 and over, for two adults with two children. A modest, basic basket (the poverty line), not a resident’s budget. A size-class region is not the town itself.
Unemployment rate
7.7% September 2026, three-month average, seasonally adjusted, Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo, Ontario (census metropolitan area); standard error 0.8 points. A survey estimate.

Waterloo

Climate

Canadian Climate Normals, 1991–2020. Each value comes from the nearest weather station that reports it, not from the city itself.

January average
−6.3 °C Kitchener/Waterloo, 13.5 km away
July average
20.2 °C Kitchener/Waterloo, 13.5 km away
Snowfall
114.5 cm a year Toronto Pearson (Airport), 76.9 km away (more than 50 km, so it may differ from the city)
Days below −20 °C
6.5 days a year Kitchener/Waterloo, 13.5 km away

People

2021 Census. Figures are for the municipality of Waterloo, not the metropolitan area. Statistics Canada rounds counts, so small places are approximate.

Population
121,436 people up 15.7% from 2016
Official languages
English only 89.6% · French only 0.0% · English and French 8.6% · neither 1.7% Share of residents who can conduct a conversation in each. This is not the language spoken at home.
Immigrants
27.5% of residents arrived 2016–2021: 5.6% · non-permanent residents: 8.7%
Indigenous identity
1.3% of residents
How people commute
car, truck or van 83.9% · public transit 6.5% · walking or cycling 6.9% · other 2.7% Average commute: 20.8 minutes. Shares are of people who commute.The way Canadians commute was altered in 2021 by the pandemic, with lockdowns to slow the spread of COVID-19 and changes in how and where Canadians worked leading to 2.8 million fewer commuters, compared with five years earlier. Statistics Canada, The Daily, 30 Nov 2022(opens in a new tab)
Median household income
$94,000 before tax $82,000 after tax · income year 2020, in 2020 dollars

Rural and remote

This describes the place named by the program’s location label. Programs can train in several towns, so it is not every site.

Population centre
Kitchener, a large urban population centre (100,000 or more people) 522,888 people in 2021
Remoteness index
0.083 0 is least remote, 1 is most remote. Statistics Canada calls this index experimental.

Housing, cost and work

Each figure names the area it covers. A missing line means the source publishes nothing for this area.

Rental vacancy rate
4.0% October 2025 survey, Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo, Ontario (census metropolitan area). The share of purpose-built rentals (three units and over) vacant, not a rent.
Basic cost of living
$55,434 a year Market Basket Measure 2025, Ontario, population 500,000 and over, for two adults with two children. A modest, basic basket (the poverty line), not a resident’s budget. A size-class region is not the town itself.
Unemployment rate
7.7% September 2026, three-month average, seasonally adjusted, Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo, Ontario (census metropolitan area); standard error 0.8 points. A survey estimate.

Sources and licences

  • Contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence - Canada. Adapted from Statistics Canada, 2021 Census Cartographic Boundary Files.
  • Adapted from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, Rental Market Survey, October 2025 (vacancy rates), and Statistics Canada, Table 34-10-0130-01. This does not constitute an endorsement by Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation or Statistics Canada of this product.
  • Data Source: Environment and Climate Change Canada (Canadian Climate Normals 1991-2020).
  • Adapted from Statistics Canada, Index of Remoteness (17-26-0001), 2021. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
  • Adapted from Statistics Canada, Table 14-10-0459-01 Labour force characteristics by census metropolitan area, three-month moving average, seasonally adjusted, reference month 2026-09. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
  • Adapted from Statistics Canada, Table 11-10-0066-01 Market Basket Measure (MBM) thresholds for the reference family by Market Basket Measure region, component and base year, 2025. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
  • Adapted from Statistics Canada, Table 98-10-0011-01 Population and dwelling counts: Canada and population centres, 2021 Census. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
  • Adapted from Statistics Canada, Table 98-10-0002-01 Population and dwelling counts: Canada and census subdivisions (municipalities), 2021 Census. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
  • Adapted from Statistics Canada, Table 98-10-0057-01 Household income statistics by household type: Canada, provinces and territories, census divisions and census subdivisions, 2021 Census. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
  • Adapted from Statistics Canada, Table 98-10-0173-01 Mother tongue by knowledge of official languages: Canada, provinces and territories, census divisions and census subdivisions, 2021 Census. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
  • Adapted from Statistics Canada, Table 98-10-0266-01 Indigenous identity by Registered or Treaty Indian status: Canada, provinces and territories, census divisions and census subdivisions, 2021 Census. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
  • Adapted from Statistics Canada, Table 98-10-0307-01 Immigrant status and period of immigration by place of birth: Canada, provinces and territories, census divisions and census subdivisions, 2021 Census. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
  • Adapted from Statistics Canada, Table 98-10-0458-01 Main mode of commuting by commuting duration, time leaving for work, age and gender: Canada, provinces and territories, census divisions and census subdivisions, 2021 Census. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.

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 8 Oct 2026.