Foot doctors. In Ontario most are chiropodists trained at one Toronto school; in the West and Quebec, podiatrists train for as long as physicians.
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The median pay is about $57,000 a year. Across everyone in the job it runs from about $33,000 at the lower end to about $123,000 at the upper end. The source is listed under Sources at the end of this page.
7 to 11 years after high school, on the usual route.
$65,000 to $375,000 all in for tuition, fees, exams and kit. Living costs are not counted.
It depends where you work. You need a licence, certificate or registration in Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, New Brunswick, Ontario, Quebec and Saskatchewan. Elsewhere there is none to hold, though many employers still ask for training or a certificate.
Good demand nationally, from government outlook data. Demand varies by region, so check your area.
Or read the whole thing here
What you earn and what it costs to get there.
Median
$57,000
Lower end
$33,000
Upper end
$123,000
Job Bank reports yearly figures from the 2021 census for this job: a low of $32,867, a median of $56,800 and a high of $123,000. Many people in this job are self-employed, so income depends on how busy the practice is, and business costs come off the top.
About $71,500
The Job Bank median in BC (British Columbia), the highest of the 4 provinces it reports
Alberta is about $64,000 and Ontario $62,000. Quebec is lowest at about $46,800. Private practice income depends on how fast you fill a schedule.
Roughly, all in
$65,000 to $375,000
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
The low end is a bachelor's degree at a cheaper university followed by the three year chiropody advanced diploma in Toronto at about 34,000 dollars in tuition and fees, plus the registration exam and first licence. The high end is the doctor of podiatric medicine at a US school, where four years of tuition alone comes to roughly 240,000 US dollars; the figure shown converts that to Canadian dollars at recent exchange rates and adds the degree before it. Chiropodists and podiatrists do much of the same work in Ontario, so the expensive route is not needed to practise there. Living costs while studying abroad sit on top of everything here.
The chiropody route is the affordable one. The US doctorate can leave you with well over $200,000 in debt.
Private fees
Most of the income. Provincial health plans cover little or none of chiropody, so patients pay directly or through work insurance.
Custom orthotics
Insurance-covered orthotics are a big revenue line for many clinics.
Salary
Community health centres, some hospitals and long-term care homes employ chiropodists for diabetic foot care.
Surgery
Podiatrists with surgical training bill for procedures such as bunion and nail surgery.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
Two very different routes, depending on where you want to practise.
High school
Grades 11 and 12
Biology, chemistry and math. You need marks good enough for a science degree.
Bachelor's degree
4 years
Michener wants a science degree with anatomy and physiology, or a kinesiology degree, and at least a 2.70 CGPA (cumulative grade point average). US podiatry schools also want the MCAT (medical school admission test).
Route A: chiropody in Ontario
3 years
The 3-year advanced diploma at the Michener Institute in Toronto, the only chiropody program in Canada. Hybrid classes, an on-site clinic from first year, and external placements in year three. Admission uses the Casper situational test as half the decision.
Route B: doctor of podiatric medicine
4 to 7 years
A 4-year doctorate at a US podiatric medical school, or the French-language program at UQTR (Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières), followed for US graduates by a hospital residency of at least 2 years, usually 3. In Quebec the residency is optional and needed only for bone surgery.
Register
After training
Ontario: pass the College of Chiropodists of Ontario exam. Alberta: register with the College of Podiatric Physicians of Alberta after the US board exams. BC (British Columbia): the College of Physicians and Surgeons of BC. Quebec: the Ordre des podiatres du Québec.
Biology
Anatomy, infection, wound healing.
Chemistry
Required for the science degree and for the US doctorate.
Math and physics
Biomechanics: how the foot carries the body.
English
Patient notes, and the Casper test rewards clear reasoning.
BC (British Columbia), Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick license foot specialists. The Atlantic provinces apart from New Brunswick, and the territories, have no licence. Ontario has two classes under the College of Chiropodists of Ontario: chiropodists, trained at Michener, and podiatrists, who hold a US doctorate. Alberta, BC and Quebec register only doctorate-trained podiatrists.
Quebec is the only province with a podiatric medicine doctorate, a 4 year French program you enter straight from CEGEP (public college).
Finish Secondary V
Age 16 or 17
With Secondary V math (Technical and Scientific, or Science option), chemistry and physics. These are the entry courses for the CEGEP (public college) science program.
Science DEC (Diploma of College Studies)
2 years
A 2 year CEGEP (public college) program (200.B1), offered in English at Dawson and the other English colleges. The doctorate asks for its biology and chemistry courses.
Doctorate in podiatric medicine (7017)
4 years
4 years, 195 credits and over 4,000 hours of classes and practical training at UQTR (Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières), in French. Only 25 places a year.
Clinical training
Years 3 and 4
Hands-on care of patients builds through the program, and clinical training continues in June of third year and in the summer of fourth year.
Permit from the order
After graduating
Apply to the Ordre des podiatres du Québec (the Quebec order of podiatrists) with your diploma, proof of French and professional insurance. Once fees are paid, its board issues your permit.
Things you don't need, but that help.
Surgical training
A US doctorate and residency lets you do bone surgery. Chiropodists are limited to soft tissue and nail procedures.
Diabetic foot and wound care
Hospitals and health centres hire for this specifically as diabetes rates climb.
Sports and biomechanics
Runners and athletes pay privately for gait analysis and custom orthotics.
Clinic ownership
Owners are paid from the clinic's profit.
Shadowing a chiropodist or podiatrist
Programs want proof you know what the job is, including the unglamorous parts.
Comfort with older patients and wounds
A large share of the work is diabetic and elderly foot care.
Business sense
Most graduates end up running a clinic.
French
Opens the Quebec route and its French-language doctorate.
Quebec is the only province with a Canadian podiatric medicine doctorate, taught in French at UQTR (Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières). Graduates register with the Ordre des podiatres du Québec. If you are bilingual and want the full doctor-level scope without US tuition, it is the one domestic option.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
Fifteen to twenty-five patients: ingrown toenails, corns and calluses, plantar fasciitis, diabetic foot checks and wound dressings, fungal nails, custom orthotic casting and fitting. Small procedures under local anaesthetic. Lots of older patients who cannot reach their own feet. In a surgical podiatry practice, mornings may be bunion or hammertoe surgery. Clinic owners spend evenings on billing and insurance forms.
The good
The hard parts
Things people don't tell you.
Ontario capped new registrations of doctorate-trained podiatrists for decades and built the profession around chiropodists instead. The College of Chiropodists of Ontario now supports a full-scope podiatry model that removes the cap, renames the profession and adds a podiatry program in Ontario.
To practise as a podiatrist in Alberta you need a doctor of podiatric medicine degree from a school approved by the US Council on Podiatric Medical Education, a residency of at least 2 years, and all three parts of the American podiatric licensing exam.
UQTR (Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières) runs the only podiatric medicine doctorate in Canada, in French, and takes 25 students a year. The lowest R-score (the CEGEP ranking score) admitted for fall 2026 was 32.276.
Every list is built from the same numbers shown above, so you can see where this career sits next to the others.
Therapy and rehab first, then the rest of the field. See every career in health.
Last checked October 2026. Pay figures are typical full-time annual amounts in Canadian dollars, based on Government of Canada Job Bank wage data and published salary grids. They vary by province, employer and experience. Tuition is for domestic students. How every figure on this site is sourced and checked.
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