Rural Pembroke - Family Medicine

University of OttawaRural Pembroke, OntarioCMG stream

Program websiteWebsite CANPREPPCANPREPP1 more link

Open on carms.ca

CaRMS program description, 2026 match, last approved 16 Sep 2025

From the 2026 match (R-1 2026). See the 2027 version

Positions (approx. quota): 5 positions
Length: 2 years
Stream: CMG
Discipline: Family Medicine
Applications per year: 601+
Applicants offered interviews: 51–75%
Accreditation: Accredited
CaRMS program ID: 30108

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

Summary

The University of Ottawa Family Medicine Rural Pembroke program offers a comprehensive two-year residency in a vibrant rural community located 140 km west of Ottawa. Residents receive full-spectrum, hands-on training across various clinical settings, with a focus on rural and comprehensive family medicine, preparing graduates for diverse practice opportunities.

Training

Research

Residents are encouraged to develop quality improvement and primary care research skills.

Training setting

Located in Pembroke, Ontario, a rural community 1.5 hours from Ottawa, with training primarily at Pembroke Regional Hospital, a 105-bed regional center serving a 100,000 person catchment area.

Teaching approach

Competency-based medical education emphasizing comprehensive, patient-centered care across the lifespan, with a focus on progressive independence and hands-on learning.

Setting types

Rural community hospital
Regional medical center
First Nations health clinic

Focus areas

Rural Family Medicine
Comprehensive Care
Remote Community Medicine
Full-spectrum Family Practice

Patient populations

Rural community patients
First Nations patients
Geriatric patients
Pediatric patients
Emergency medicine patients

Highlights

Half-horizontal curriculum
Remote exposure in Barry's Bay and Deep River
Monthly academic days in Ottawa
Longitudinal remote training option
Pikwakanagan First Nations Health Clinic exposure

Strengths

95% of graduates choose rural practice
Comprehensive rural training
Diverse clinical exposure
Strong community integration

Enhanced skills

Remote medicine skills
First Nations health care

By year

PGY-1

Family MedicinePembroke Regional Hospital6 blocks
GeriatricsPembroke Regional HospitalPart of 6-block mix
Emergency MedicinePembroke Regional HospitalPart of 6-block mix
PsychiatryPembroke Regional Hospital2 blocks
Hospitalist MedicinePembroke Regional Hospital1 block
ObstetricsPembroke Regional Hospital1 block
Internal MedicinePembroke Regional Hospital1 block
ElectiveVaries1 block
PediatricsCHEO2 weeks
First Nations Health ClinicPikwakanaganA few days

PGY-2

Family MedicinePembroke Regional Hospital6 blocks
GeriatricsPembroke Regional HospitalPart of 6-block mix
Emergency MedicinePembroke Regional HospitalPart of 6-block mix
ElectiveVaries2 blocks
Hospitalist MedicinePembroke Regional Hospital1 block
Rural Family MedicineRemote communities1 block
ObstetricsPembroke Regional Hospital1 block
SurgeryPembroke Regional Hospital1 block
SelectiveVaries1 block
First Nations Health ClinicPikwakanaganA few days

From the program's rotation list.

Selection

What the program looks at

FMProC Situational Judgement Test
Medical Student Performance Record (MSPR)
Personal letter
Reference letters
Interview performance

Applications per year

601+

Applicants offered interviews

51–75%

Interviews

Dates (2026 match): 27, 28 and 29 Jan 2026

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
Level	Annual salary
PGY-1	$73,367 / year
PGY-2	$79,670 / year

One provincial scale for Ontario, set by the resident agreement, so every program there pays the same. Showing the 2 levels this program covers.

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

Pembroke Regional Hospital
CHEO (Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario)
Remote community hospitals in Barry's Bay and Deep River

Hospital facts

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

Unfilled positions in past years

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

Positions at this site, all streams.

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. Verify with the CaRMS lists. 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)). 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.

Contacts

Contacts weren't collected for the 2026 match.

The current program director and contacts are on the 2027 version of this program and on the CaRMS program page(opens in a new tab).

Location

Rural Pembroke, Ontario

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.

Climate

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

January average: −11.9 °C Petawawa, 12.8 km away
July average: 19.3 °C Petawawa, 12.8 km away
Snowfall: 199.0 cm a year Petawawa, 12.8 km away
Days below −20 °C: 30.9 days a year Charteris, 54.9 km away (more than 50 km, so it may differ from the city)

People

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

Population: 14,364 people up 3.5% from 2016
Official languages: English only 85.8% · French only 0.3% · English and French 13.8% · neither 0.2% Share of residents who can conduct a conversation in each. This is not the language spoken at home.
Immigrants: 4.5% of residents arrived 2016–2021: 0.4% · non-permanent residents: 0.4%
Indigenous identity: 12.8% of residents
How people commute: car, truck or van 86.1% · public transit not reported · walking or cycling 11.5% · other 2.6% Average commute: 17.0 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: $63,200 before tax $57,200 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: Pembroke, a small population centre (1,000 to 29,999 people) 16,571 people in 2021
Remoteness index: 0.245 0 is least remote, 1 is most remote. Statistics Canada calls this index experimental.
Rurality Index for Ontario: RIO2008 score 51 Official page(opens in a new tab)Ontario Ministry of Health, RIO2008 scores; page updated 2025-01-10; checked 9 Oct 2026
Student loan forgiveness: Family medicine here may qualify for up to $60,000 of Canada Student Loan forgiveness. Eligibility depends on the postal code of where you work: check the official postal-code lookup. Postal-code lookup(opens in a new tab)

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: 2.7% October 2025 survey, Pembroke, Ontario (census agglomeration). The share of purpose-built rentals (three units and over) vacant, not a rent.
Basic cost of living: $52,873 a year Market Basket Measure 2025, Ontario, population under 30,000, 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.

Job outlook

Employment and Social Development Canada’s rating for the occupation in the economic region. It is not a count of jobs, and says nothing about CaRMS positions or your match.

Outlook, 2025–2027: Good The employment outlook will be Good for general practitioners and family physicians (NOC 31102) in the Kingston - Pembroke region for the 2025-2027 period.
Canada-wide, to 2033: Strong risk of Shortage ESDC’s projection for general practitioners and family physicians, 2024–2033. Recent conditions, 2021–2023: Strong signs of Shortage.

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 34-10-0132-01. This does not constitute an endorsement by Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation or Statistics Canada of this product.
Contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence - Canada (Employment and Social Development Canada, Canadian Occupational Projection System (COPS), 2024 to 2033 projections).
Data Source: Environment and Climate Change Canada (Canadian Climate Normals 1991-2020).
Contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence - Canada (Employment and Social Development Canada, 3-Year Employment Outlooks).
Adapted from Statistics Canada, Index of Remoteness (17-26-0001), 2021. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.
Source: Employment and Social Development Canada, Canada Student Loan Forgiveness (Canada.ca), page dated 2026-06-03.
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.
Source: Ontario Ministry of Health, Rurality Index for Ontario (RIO2008) score, page updated 2025-01-10.
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 5 Oct 2026.