Amazing idea: Blind medical school and CaRMS applications of all applicant names until interview selections are complete

Compared with the general population, Canadian physicians have a skewed demographic profile, with less economic diversity; underrepresentation of black Canadians, First Nations people, and Hispanic Canadians; and an overrepresentation of Chinese and South-Asian Canadians. Because a person’s name can reveal ethnicity, religion, sex, and perhaps even socioeconomic strata, it serves as a potential source of unconscious or unacknowledged bias in the minds of those who review the files. This bias can further exacerbate the asymmetry in medical schools and residencies. There is good evidence to show patient health and satisfaction improve with increasing similarity to their physicians; for this reason we should aim to produce a physician pool that more closely matches the general population. By eliminating applicants’ names until after interview invitations are sent we would be following the example of numerous postsecondary institutions globally in an attempt to reduce the risk of discrimination for applicants and hopefully increase our medical communities’ diversity so as to better serve our patients.