Postgraduate Program

The University of Ottawa Plastic Surgery Residency Program offers a comprehensive education in plastic surgery. It provides a strong foundation for any career in plastic surgery or for further fellowship training. The program is 5 years in length and grants enrolment for two residents in each academic year, with a total of 10 residents in the program.  In conjunction with the rest of the country, the University of Ottawa transitioned to a Competency by Design (CBD) evaluation metric in July 2020.

Candidate Selection

All documentation submitted to CaRMS will be considered by the selection committee. Candidates will be ranked on the basis of their academic records, electives, letters of reference and CV. The top candidates will be invited for an interview.

Given the COVID-19 pandemic, interviews for the 2021 match will be offered virtually. Candidates will be asked a series of standardized questions that are designed to identify a fit between the candidate and the program, as well as some time for less formal conversation and questions.

While we are not able to offer an in-person tour of the facility, information about our skills and simulation centre, the rapid access clinic and the operating facilities is available on this website.

Foundations years (years 1 and 2).

The foundations years consist of several off-service rotations including Orthopedics, Emergency Medicine, Neurosurgery, Vascular Surgery, General Surgery, Intensive Care, Oral Maxillofacial Surgery, Mohs Micrographic Surgery, Otolaryngology and Occuloplastics. Residents will also have a 12-18 month rotation in plastic surgery at pediatric, academic and community sites.

The formal Surgical Foundations curriculum includes lectures, simulation labs and courses designed to provide residents with the skills necessary to meet criteria for surgical foundations. In addition, it serves as excellent preparation for the foundations examination at the end of the second year. Dr. Kirsty Boyd represents Plastic Surgery at the University of Ottawa Surgical Foundations Committee and serves as a member of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada Surgical Foundations Test Committee.

The University of Ottawa has one of Canada’s foremost skills and simulation labs. This lab provides opportunities for low and high-fidelity simulation in all areas of surgical practice. Interdisciplinary simulations can be conducted to improve safety and efficiency in the operating room. In addition, models and cadaver dissections allow for the development of surgical skills at an accelerated rate.

Senior plastic surgery years (years 3, 4 and 5).

The training in plastic surgery is designed to instruct residents in all areas of surgical discipline. In addition, residents are encouraged to gain exposure to various types of practice through specific rotations in all areas of plastic surgery. Programs are designed to address each competency and include:

  • Aesthetic surgery
  • Burn surgery
  • Craniofacial surgery
  • Gender reaffirmation
  • Hand and wrist surgery
  • Microsurgery
  • Nerve surgery
  • Paediatric surgery

Opportunities for international surgery, global health surgery, and electives are also

offered in senior years.

Aesthetic Surgery – Residents are exposed to aesthetic surgery primarily in their fourth and fifth year aesthetic surgery rotations. Residents are introduced to all aspects of cosmetic surgery including practice management and non-surgical aesthetic medicine. Fourth and fifth year residents also participate in a unique educational program to develop their surgical skills. The Division of Plastic Surgery developed the Resident Aesthetic Clinic to provide residents with intensive surgical training in all aspects of aesthetic plastic surgery.  This program is supervised and run by Dr. Howard Silverman.

Patients of our Resident Aesthetic Clinic have access to a wide range of economically priced cosmetic surgeries conducted with the highest standard of care and safety. Residents perform surgeries in their final years of training under the supervision of faculty plastic surgeons.  Surgeons involved in our aesthetic surgery program include Dr. Howard Silverman, Dr. Daniel Peters, Dr. Kirsty Boyd, and Dr. Sean Smith.

Burn surgery – Each resident will spend 2 blocks on the burn unit at Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto during their PGY-3 year. During this time the resident will have an immersive exposure to acute adult burn management and reconstruction.  At CHEO, a comprehensive pediatric burn care program has been developed by Dr. Claudia Malic.  Under her supervision, residents will be exposed to a complete array of acute burn management and burn reconstruction in pediatric patients.

Craniofacial – We have a comprehensive CF program comprising reconstruction of congenial oncologic and traumatic craniofacial differences.  Our pediatric program is based out of CHEO and includes exposure to craniosynostosis, facial cleft and other complex craniofacial differences. We collaborate extensively with neurosurgery, ENT, dentistry and other health care professionals. Our adult program is based out of TOH and involves secondary reconstruction of congenital differences as well as traumatic and oncologic problems.  We are heavily involved in collaborations with ophthalmology, neurosurgery, ENT and OMFS.  Residents will gain exposure to a complex array of problems and gain valuable perspectives from multiple surgeons in multiple disciplines.  Surgeons involved in the craniofacial program include Dr. Daniel Peters, Dr. Grayson Roumeliotis, Dr. David McAuley (pediatric neurosurgery), Dr. John Sinclair (adult neurosurgery) who form the leadership portion of the program at our partner institutions.

Gender reaffirmation – Our program is committed to diversity. We strongly support a gender affirming program.  There are multiple faculty involved in this program including top surgery, body contouring and facial aesthetic surgery.  Our program is based at multiple training sites including TOH, CHEO, and the Queensway-Carleton Hospital.  Leadership in our program is provided by Dr. Sean Smith, Dr. Kevin Cheung, Dr. Mario Jarmuske.

Hand and wrist – Hand and wrist surgery comprise a large section of our training program.  We have a multidisciplinary program that includes plastic surgery, orthopedic surgery, occupational and physical therapy.  Residents in our program will be exposed to a full complement of traumatic, degenerative, oncologic and elective hand surgery in emergency, minor procedure and main operating room settings.  Our Rapid Access Clinic has a full minor surgery room complete with fluoroscopy and power equipment.  Our program is based at multiple training sites including TOH, CHEO and the Queensway-Carleton Hospital.  Leadership in our program is provided by Dr. Sarah Shiga (TOH) and Dr. Kevin Cheung (CHEO). All surgeons are involved in hand surgery, however several faculty focus primarily on this subspecialty including Dr. Sarah Shiga, Dr. Brent Trull, and Dr. Kevin Cheung.

Microsurgery – Residents received microsurgical training through clinical encounters as well as in a structured microsurgery lab at the Surgical Skills Centre. In all years of training, including their first year, residents are provided with closely supervised training, during which they will progress from operating on model vessels to flap dissection to live animal anastomosis.  Surgeons involved in our microsurgery program include Dr. Simon Frank, Dr. Moein Momtazi, Dr. Jing Zhang, Dr. Brent Trull, Dr. Sarah Shiga, Dr. Kirsty Boyd, Dr. Kevin Cheung and Dr. Gloria Rockwell.  Our program includes a wide variety of traumatic and oncologic microsurgical exposure including head and neck, breast reconstruction, lower extremity reconstruction, trunk and abdominal reconstruction, pediatric microsurgery and lymphedema surgery.

Nerve Surgery – Our residents are exposed to a comprehensive, high-volume, multidisciplinary and cutting edge nerve surgery program.  The Peripheral Nerve Trauma Clinic was co-founded by Dr. Kirsty Boyd (plastic surgery) and Dr. Gerald Wolff (physiatry) and offers assessment and electrodiagnostic study during consultations and follow up.  Dr. Boyd offers a full complement of nerve procedures including nerve tumor surgery, nerve grafting, upper and lower extremity nerve transfers, brachial plexus surgery and most recently targeted motor reinnervation and regenerative peripheral nerve interface surgery in our amputee population.  Working in close conjunction with physiatry, neurology, orthopedics and neurosurgery, our nerve program is state of the art.  In 2015, Dr. Boyd performed Canada’s first nerve transfers to restore upper extremity function in a patient with tetraplegia.

Paediatric plastic surgery is provided at the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario. This is a pediatric tertiary care centre that provides comprehensive exposure to all facets of paediatric plastic surgery including burn surgery, hand surgery, cleft surgery, pediatric craniofacial surgery, pediatric breast surgery, gender affirmation surgery and general reconstruction. Surgeons involved in our pediatric program include Dr. Yvonne Ying, Dr. Claudia Malic, Dr. Kevin Cheung, Dr. Daniel Peters, and Dr. Grayson Roumeliotis.

Contact the Program Director

If you have further questions please feel free to contact:

Program Administrator

Marika Valle
Postgraduate Program Administrator
Plastic Surgery
The Ottawa Hospital – University of Ottawa
Department of Surgery, Eric Poulin Office of Education
Division of Plastic Surgery, Thoracic Surgery, and Urology
Email: mvalle@toh.ca
Phone: 613-798-5555 ext 10601
Fax: 613-761-4819

Program Director

Kirsty Boyd MD, FRCSC
Program Director Plastic Surgery
Associate Professor – University of Ottawa
Department of Surgery
The Ottawa Hospital – Civic Campus
1053 Carling Avenue Box 213
Ottawa, ON K1Y 4E9