Did not receive Upfront Medical Report - Question

[natsul]

Hi Everyone. My wife is a Canadian citizen and I am a US CItizen. We live in Los Angeles and filed for outland spousal application in Decemeber 2013. Now in April 2014, we noticed that on CIC ECAS our 'Medical received' has not yet been updated. Tracking other December 2013 filers for Ottawa Office, I can see they got their medicals linked already in Feb/March 2014.

We had done the upfront medical in October 2013 at one of two CIC panel physicans (Dr. Steven Gitlin) listed for Los Angeles, CA. After the exam the only receipt the physican gave us was handwritten cash receipt for Date and Type of Service, plus amount paid. I had asked them at the time that if I will get any formal document as a receipt, and they had said no, and that they will send the medical report directly to CIC (it will take 3-4 days). At the time they did seem surprised that I was doing medical before filing and that I didnt have a letter for medical from CIC. This should have been a red flag for me, and I should have gone to another physician, but I didn't. The physican's office looked very unorganized as well. We filed our application with a photocopy of cash receipt (which does not list any ID number etc.) as a proof. We had used a law firm for filing the paperwork, and they did not see any issue with the cash receipt, nor told us about IMM 1017E.

Fast forward to today, upon further research I found CIC link which states that for upfront medical we should have received and send IMM 1017E along with this application. We did not know about this before. Anyways, I called the panel physican's office today, and received 'phone number is no longer in service' message. Upon online research found that this Dr.'s office has been closed. We checked CIC approved physican webpage and saw that this physican is no longer listed for California.

What should we do now? Shall we contact CIC, the Call Center toll free 1-888-242-2100 is not reachable from US..To be proactive shall we re-do the medical exam from the other physical for Los Angeles. We dont want to delay our application due to this, and looking for any measures we can take to rectify this issue?

Your help is greatly appreciated!

Thanks!
Natsul

 

[rhcohen2014]

it may be best to redo the medical if you can't get in touch with cic. when i went, i received a receipt called "e-medical", and it had all my information, my picture, and a bar code for CIC. When I was there, the doctor had to enter my information into a special system on the computer and printed me out a copy. at some point they are going to request the medical exam, so aiting for that request is a good option if you can't pay for it now.

 

[mikeymyke]

You were supposed to get a black and white emedical form immediately after the exam.

 

[commonlawsponsor]

Wow, what a crappy situation!

I would try contacting the VO office handling your application, as well as maybe have someone in Canada call the CIC and find out.

I would also call the other panel physician and set up an appointment a couple weeks from now in case you can't get your results. I'm assuming the medical wasn't cheap and I wouldn't like to pay for it again unless I was sure the other doctor didn't send your results.

 

[zardoz]

Under these circumstances, I would not hesitate to do the medical again from the beginning. Yes, it costs money, but without it, you are going nowhere... Maybe I over-prepare but I had issues with MY medical in the UK, and had to run around getting it sorted out. (It's the reason that I found this forum. Look at my very first post : )

 

[natsul]

Thanks commonlawsponsor. At this point, money is not a concern and I am leaning towards getting the medical done again at the other physician. Los Angeles, USA VO no longer handles sponsorship applications and our VO office is Ottawa, Canada. We tried calling Ottawa 1.888.xxxxxx number from USA and it did not work. Then on this newsgroup found a 613 number that we called this morning, CIC answered and asked if we were outbound, and that we should email Ottawa VO, and that they cannot assist me over the phone. Not really sure how to explain this in email to Ottawa VO, plus don't want to waste more time waiting.

Now the dilemma is I want to be sure they don't have the medical, because if I redo the medical now and send it, it is not really upfront anymore right? Additionally what if the first medical gets linked anyways, and having 2 medicals will it cause issue? My application is in 'Application Received' stage at Ottawa VO. I read about GCMS ATIP notes.. will requesting those offer any insight?

Wow, what a crappy situation!

I would try contacting the VO office handling your application, as well as maybe have someone in Canada call the CIC and find out.

I would also call the other panel physician and set up an appointment a couple weeks from now in case you can't get your results. I'm assuming the medical wasn't cheap and I wouldn't like to pay for it again unless I was sure the other doctor didn't send your results.

 

[natsul]

Thanks Zardog. I read your first post and it was insightful. I wish I had done bit more research like you instead of settling with that physicians incompetence. Time is more important to us than the medical fees right now.

I am going to call the other physical to get the medical done. This time around I will make sure I get the IMM1017 form.

Question - How do I get this new IMM1017 form to Ottawa VO and make sure it gets attached to my file? Can i email them a scanned copy? Do I need to explain the situation in the email? Will this still be treated as an 'upfront' medical. I already have a UCI and File Number, our application is in 'Application Received' stage(Sponsor approval was done back in January 2014).

When the physician sends the medical directly to CIC, are they sending it to Missisuaga or local VO?

Apologies for so many questions.

Thanks!

Under these circumstances, I would not hesitate to do the medical again from the beginning. Yes, it costs money, but without it, you are going nowhere... Maybe I over-prepare but I had issues with MY medical in the UK, and had to run around getting it sorted out. (It's the reason that I found this forum. Look at my very first post : )

 

[Avadava]

Thanks Zardog. I read your first post and it was insightful. I wish I had done bit more research like you instead of settling with that physicians incompetence. Time is more important to us than the medical fees right now.

I am going to call the other physical to get the medical done. This time around I will make sure I get the IMM1017 form.

Question - How do I get this new IMM1017 form to Ottawa VO and make sure it gets attached to my file? Can i email them a scanned copy? Do I need to explain the situation in the email? Will this still be treated as an 'upfront' medical. I already have a UCI and File Number, our application is in 'Application Received' stage(Sponsor approval was done back in January 2014).

When the physician sends the medical directly to CIC, are they sending it to Missisuaga or local VO?

Apologies for so many questions.

Thanks!

MY eMedical does not have a number (IMM1017) on it. It just says "eMedical Information Sheet", has a UMI number on it (Unique Medical Identifier) and my personal details. The Panel Physician takes a picture of you in their office which they attach to the file. After the medical exam, they will hand you this eMedical paper for you to include in your application before you send it.

The doctor then forwards the information to the CIC Health Branch in your region (I got mine done in Europe so my results were sent to The High Commission in London). A CIC Medical Officer at the Regional Health Branch will assess your results. Your VO (Ottawa) does not decide on your medical. They simply look at the UMI number on the eMedical Information Sheet you included in your application and match your file to that UMI in their data base.

I did my medical on Oct. 2013 and it wasn't until Dec. that I sent in my application. But my medical results were assessed right away, because I received a letter from the Health Branch to go back for further tests 9 days after I had done my medical exam.

You mention that you have a UCI, a File number and SA already. I honestly think that your medical was already received by CIC. There is a member on this forum called Zarilenth (January applicant) and she didn't submit her medical along with the application. She received a letter (before SA) from CIC where they requested the medical. You could message her for more info.

Like I said, if your medical was missing, I believe they would have requested it before Sponsor Approval. But for your own peace of mind, if you want to re-do the exam, you can send the paper to Ottawa (after SA, Mississauga sends the file to the VO) and make sure you include a cover letter explaining the situation. Also, provide your UCI, File number, DoB, Name, PoB, address, etc.

The physician sends the medical results to the Regional Health Branch, where a CIC Medical Officer will assess your exam.

 

[Alurra71]

Hi Everyone. My wife is a Canadian citizen and I am a US CItizen. We live in Los Angeles and filed for outland spousal application in Decemeber 2013. Now in April 2014, we noticed that on CIC ECAS our 'Medical received' has not yet been updated. Tracking other December 2013 filers for Ottawa Office, I can see they got their medicals linked already in Feb/March 2014.

We had done the upfront medical in October 2013 at one of two CIC panel physicans (Dr. Steven Gitlin) listed for Los Angeles, CA. After the exam the only receipt the physican gave us was handwritten cash receipt for Date and Type of Service, plus amount paid. I had asked them at the time that if I will get any formal document as a receipt, and they had said no, and that they will send the medical report directly to CIC (it will take 3-4 days). At the time they did seem surprised that I was doing medical before filing and that I didnt have a letter for medical from CIC. This should have been a red flag for me, and I should have gone to another physician, but I didn't. The physican's office looked very unorganized as well. We filed our application with a photocopy of cash receipt (which does not list any ID number etc.) as a proof. We had used a law firm for filing the paperwork, and they did not see any issue with the cash receipt, nor told us about IMM 1017E.

Fast forward to today, upon further research I found CIC link which states that for upfront medical we should have received and send IMM 1017E along with this application. We did not know about this before. Anyways, I called the panel physican's office today, and received 'phone number is no longer in service' message. Upon online research found that this Dr.'s office has been closed. We checked CIC approved physican webpage and saw that this physican is no longer listed for California.

What should we do now? Shall we contact CIC, the Call Center toll free 1-888-242-2100 is not reachable from US..To be proactive shall we re-do the medical exam from the other physical for Los Angeles. We dont want to delay our application due to this, and looking for any measures we can take to rectify this issue?

Your help is greatly appreciated!

Thanks!
Natsul

I also filed my application with only a photocopy of the receipts I had received when I did my medical. It was fine and acceptable and my eCas NEVER showed 'Medical received'. Try to not to follow the eCas to terrribly closely as it's up to each individual VO to update or not update as they choose. If you are terribly concerned, you can email Ottawa and give them your UCI and such and tell them due to your panel physician no longer being listed on the CIC website and the physical office being closed you just wanted to verify that they did in fact have your medical results. If they need you to do them again, this should trigger them to email you and ask you to do them again.

Good luck.

 

[natsul]

Thank you everyone for your valuable and informative suggestions. It helped us a lot. Today we ended up getting in touch with Missisuaga CIC, to ask if they ever received our medical from panel physican. They checked based on name and other information. They indeed received it sometime in December 2013.
We asked them that will our VO- Ottawa be able to link this medical record without a ID # (just based on my name), since we never had a official from the physican to send with our application. The represenative gave us our medical IME# and recommened that we email Ottawa and provide this IME# so they will be able to link the medical.
We are glad to get this sorted out...

Thanks!