(CANADA) — Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada held its first Express Entry round aimed exclusively at physicians with Canadian work experience on February 19, 2026, issuing 391 Invitations to Apply for permanent residence at a minimum Comprehensive Ranking System score of 169.
The draw, numbered #397, produced the lowest cut-off score since a 2021 pandemic-era Canadian Experience Class draw at 75, and it ranked as the second-lowest in Express Entry history.
Canada’s points-based Express Entry system ranks candidates, and IRCC periodically invites top-ranked profiles to apply for permanent residence. A category-based round narrows that selection to candidates who meet a specific set of criteria, such as work experience in an occupation that the government has prioritized.
An Invitation to Apply, known as an ITA, does not grant permanent residence on its own. It allows a candidate to submit a full permanent residence application for IRCC to assess.
For physicians already working in Canada, the February 19 round signalled a targeted pathway that focuses on in-Canada experience. The minimum score of 169 stood out because it reflected selection within a small, tightly defined group, rather than the broader Express Entry pool.
IRCC used a tie-breaking rule to decide who received invitations when candidates shared the same CRS score. The department set the tie-break at January 3, 2026, at 3:25:14 UTC, meaning it prioritized eligible profiles created before that time.
Eligibility also depended on the National Occupational Classification code tied to a candidate’s work experience. IRCC limited the draw to candidates with at least one year of recent Canadian work experience in 31100 (Specialists in clinical and laboratory medicine), 31101 (Specialists in surgery), or 31102 (General practitioners and family physicians).
Matching the correct NOC code often requires more than a job title. Candidates typically need to show that their duties align with the occupational description, and that their work history documents support the claim.
That documentation can matter as much as the CRS score in a targeted round, because category-based selection still operates within the integrity checks of the permanent residence application. A candidate who receives an ITA must later substantiate eligibility, including skilled work history, when submitting the full application.
Common problems in occupation-based selection can include choosing a NOC code that does not match day-to-day responsibilities, failing to document skilled work properly, or leaving gaps and inconsistencies across employment records. In a system that relies on verifiable history, inconsistencies can slow processing or complicate an application after an ITA arrives.
The physicians category launched one day after Immigration Minister Lena Metlege Diab announced six new 2026 Express Entry priority groups on February 18, 2026, at the Canadian Club of Toronto. Her announcement included physicians with Canadian work experience, researchers and senior managers with Canadian work experience, transport-sector professionals such as pilots and aircraft mechanics, STEM specialists, trades workers, and francophone candidates.
Diab said: “Canada’s future depends on a workforce ready to meet the challenges of a changing economy. By refining Express Entry to focus on the skills our communities truly need, we are strengthening our labour market, supporting provincial priorities and ensuring newcomers can contribute from day one.”
For physicians, the priority group also tightened the in-Canada experience threshold compared with what the announcement described as the prior minimum. The February 18 announcement specified physicians with Canadian work experience, and it doubled the prior minimum from six months to one year.
Priority in Express Entry does not remove baseline requirements for the underlying programs managed through the system. Instead, it changes which candidates IRCC targets for invitations, and how those invitations distribute across occupational or language-based categories.
The February 19 results highlighted how different a targeted pool can look compared with broader draws. A low CRS threshold in a narrowly defined category can occur even when other rounds remain far more competitive, because the selection universe shrinks to candidates who meet the category’s occupation and work-experience filters.
In practical terms, targeting physicians with Canadian work experience can also change the profile of invitees. Candidates working in Canada may qualify even if they score fewer points in some CRS components, such as language or education, because the government’s objective in a category-based draw is to select within that occupation-based group, not to mirror the distribution of the general pool.
IRCC’s explanation for the low threshold pointed to the size and nature of the eligible group. The minimum CRS score of 169 reflected a small pool of physicians already working in Canada amid acute healthcare shortages, allowing IRCC to invite nearly all qualifying candidates despite potentially lower language or education scores.
The physicians draw also fit into an early 2026 sequence that showed how different draw types can produce sharply different CRS cut-offs. On February 17, IRCC invited 6,000 candidates in a Canadian Experience Class draw with a cut-off of 508.
A day earlier, on February 16, IRCC held a Provincial Nominee Program draw that invited 279 candidates at a CRS cut-off of 789. Because provincial nomination carries a major effect on a candidate’s CRS standing, PNP rounds often sit in a different score range than occupation-based category draws or Canadian Experience Class rounds.
Those contrasts can be useful for candidates trying to interpret headlines about high or low CRS scores. A PNP cut-off reflects the presence of nominations and the profile of the invited group, while a Canadian Experience Class cut-off reflects the distribution of candidates meeting that program’s criteria.
Category-based rounds, including the February 19 physicians draw, add another layer by restricting selection to candidates who meet the category definition. That can move the cut-off in either direction, depending on how many profiles qualify and how strong their CRS scores are.
IRCC described the February 19 draw as only the second category-based round of 2026 and the ninth overall. Even so, the government’s February 18 announcement framed category-based invitations as an increasingly central part of the year’s selection approach.
The minister’s announcement said category-based rounds will comprise “well over half” of ITAs. The statement signalled a selection model in which IRCC continues to run multiple draw types, with targeted categories playing a larger role in who receives invitations.
For employers and provinces dealing with health workforce needs, the February 19 draw also suggested a faster path to permanent residence for physicians already in Canada, at least for those who meet the category’s work-experience and NOC requirements. Category-based selection can align with provincial priorities without changing the separate role that provinces play through nomination programs.
Still, IRCC did not set a schedule for future physician draws. The February 19 round showed how quickly a priority-group announcement can translate into an actual invitation round, but it did not commit the department to a fixed cadence.
For candidates who received an ITA, the next stage shifts from ranking to application assembly. Invited candidates have 60 days to submit permanent residence applications, and IRCC projected processing at six months.
Meeting the 60-day deadline can turn on how quickly candidates obtain documents that take time to request or renew. In many permanent residence applications, that can include police certificates, language test results, and evidence supporting Canadian work history, alongside other records that IRCC uses to verify eligibility.
Candidates typically need consistency across forms and supporting documents. Employment letters, for example, often play a central role in proving the work experience that made a candidate eligible for a category-based draw in the first place.
Applicants also need to track instructions that come after submission, which can include requests tied to biometrics or medical examinations. IRCC’s projected six-month timeline is an estimate and does not eliminate the need for complete applications and verifiable documentation.
For physicians who were not invited on February 19, the draw offered a narrower lesson about strategy than a general Express Entry round might. A low cut-off in a targeted category does not mean CRS competitiveness has broadly collapsed across Express Entry, and it does not automatically translate into low cut-offs in other draw types.
Candidates who remain in the pool often focus on keeping profiles accurate and up to date, maintaining eligibility, and improving scores where possible under the Comprehensive Ranking System. In a year when IRCC outlined multiple priority groups, candidates may also watch for category-based rounds that match their experience, while recognizing that priority targeting does not promise invitations or repeat draw patterns.
The February 19 round nevertheless marked a notable moment for in-Canada physicians seeking permanent residence through Express Entry, because it combined a new priority-group direction with a sharply low CRS cut-off and a small, occupation-specific invitation pool. Diab’s message at the Canadian Club of Toronto framed the approach as a way to “focus on the skills our communities truly need,” while the draw itself showed how that focus can reshape who receives an invitation and how quickly.
