About Us

The Internal Medicine Residency Program in Calgary

The Internal Medicine Residency training program is the largest Specialty Post-Graduate training program at or in the Faculty of Medicine.  Led by Program Director Dr. Paul Gibson, and Associate Program Directors (Drs. Maria Bacchus, Edwin Cheng, Jolene Haws and Alejandra Ugarte Torres), the Program is responsible for over 100 PGY1 through PGY4 level trainees.  Residents are an integral and valuable part of patient care at all Calgary acute care and ambulatory sites. The adult teaching sites in Calgary are the following:

Foothills Medical Centre
Peter Lougheed Centre
Rockyview General Hospital
South Health Campus
Richmond Road Diagnostic and Treatment Centre (ambulatory care centre)

The round-the-clock nature of the residents’ workweek significantly increases access to care.  We have Senior Medical Residents at all four hospitals 365 nights per year. This is well received by the Emergency Department and Medical Staff. The Senior Residents provide support to the Junior Residents and Clinical Clerks, which also enhance their educational experience.  

Program Highlights

The Strength of our Program is in our People! 

We are very proud of our residents, faculty and administrative staff.  Teamwork and inspiring people to do their best are core values of the Program.

There are many fantastic aspects of our program, below are some of the highlights:

  1. We have made great investments in simulation equipment and have expertise in simulation based training at all sites with a RCPSC accredited Simulation Program.
  2. We have an extremely strong ultrasound and procedural skills program in our residency program.
  3. We have an accredited SIMulation program and trainees have exposure throughout their training.
  4. We have a well established mentorship program in our Department.
  5. We have excellent research opportunities in the Department and Faculty of Medicine.
  6. We recently added a Jr. MTU wellness initiative, which provides vacation during two of the MTU rotations.

Competency-based Medical Education (CBME) or Competence by Design (CBD)


Competency-based Medical Education is a national Royal College educational initiative.  The core internal medicine residency programs across Canada formally started this initiative in July 2019.  We have been preparing for this for the past two years.  We started a pilot project in the Spring of 2017 which was successful.  We ramped this up in July 2017 and have had success in educating both the trainees as well as the faculty.  We use the RCPSC e-portfolio in Calgary.

Since July 2017 all of the PGY1's were assigned to an Academic Advisor who they meet with on a regular basis to monitor their progress.  This was a successful imitative that allowed for greater academic mentorship and support.  Presently, all of the PGY1's, 2's and 3's have assigned Academic Advisors.

We have a formal Competence Committee that reviews the progress of the trainees.  We have a program CBD lead, Dr. Darren Burback, as well as a Competence Committee chair.  The Departmental CBD Faculty Development Lead, Dr. Maria Bacchus, has been instrumental in moving initiatives forward.

All trainees in our program are expected to have one or two face-to-face assessments (Entrustable Professional Activities or EPA's) completed every week and have been asked to complete 6 EPA'S per 4-week block.

We have recently developed a CBD Subcommittee that has the involvement of trainees and faculty members.  The Department of Medicine and the Post Graduate Medical Education Office have been extremely supportive of all of the CBD initiatives and we had a successful formal start on July 1, 2019.

Educational Support

We are pleased to be able to support our trainees in providing education resource material.  This has included a three-year New England Journal of Medicine Knowledge plus subscription for all trainees in our program.  We also allow trainees additional support to take coursework that meets certain criteria.  Trainees are also provided with up to $500.00/year to attend a conference and could apply for additional funds from the PGME Office.

Thank you for your interest in the Calgary Internal Medicine Program!