The Adult Respirology Subspecialty Training Program at the University of Saskatchewan is a two year core program which covers all areas of general respirology. The resident will gain solid clinical grounding and experience in managing both inpatient and outpatients with respiratory disease.  Our graduates have an exceptional pass record on the Royal College Certification Examination and have gone on to successful academic and community practice careers throughout Canada and the United States.

Much of the first year is dedicated towards inpatient consultation and general respirology ambulatory clinics. There is no respiratory ward service. One month during the first year will also be dedicated to learning technical aspects of performing and interpreting pulmonary function tests and clinical polysomnography. Usually one to two months of research time are also provided in the first year, to give the resident an opportunity to plan research projects as well as to gain further experience in a potential area of interest. A one-month rotation in community-based respiratory medicine occurs in Regina, usually in the first year or early part of the second year of training.

The second year of training is more flexible and is intended to be customized to the resident’s particular needs, but the resident will continue to have exposure to both inpatient and outpatient general respirology. A three month mandatory rotation in Critical Care Medicine is performed in the second year. This will give the trainee further experience in critically ill patients who have both pulmonary and non-pulmonary disease as well as provide a solid clinical correlation for pulmonary and general physiology. The resident will also participate in a number of subspecialty clinics (eg. Tuberculosis, Cystic Fibrosis, Pulmonary Hypertension, Advanced COPD, Lung Transplantation), which are coordinated with multidisciplinary input.  Through the Tuberculosis outreach clinics, residents will have the opportunity to visit some remote northern Saskatchewan communities and learn the special health care challenges they face. There is also a formal cardiopulmonary rehabilitation curriculum, during which time the resident will participate in the community-based rehabilitation services offered in Saskatoon.  Several months are available for research and elective time, particularly in the second year of training.  Out of province elective time is permitted.

The weekly academic schedule runs from September through June and is as follows:

Quarterly academic half-days are jointly held with the other internal medicine subspecialty training programs, where ‘non-medical expert’ topics including ethics and professionalism will be addressed.

• Lung Association of Saskatchewan
• 2011 Respirology State of the Art Conference
• Saskatchewan Thoracic Society
• Canadian Lung Association
• Canadian Thoracic Society
• The American College of Chest Physicians
• American Thoracic Society
• European Respiratory Society
• Saskatchewan Health Research Foundation
• Canadian Institute of Health Research
• Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada
• College of Physicians and Surgeons of Saskatchewan
• Canadian Respiratory Conference