at my program pa students were treated just like medstudents, sent to the same facilities with the same preceptors and had the same responsibilities while there. as a clinical pa student I
delivered babies,
intubated pts,
put in chest tubes and central lines, performed open cardiac massage
1st assisted at c-sections and trauma surgical procedures,
performed tubal ligations as primary surgeon with the ob doc 1st assisting me(after I saw a few and 1st assisted him),
performed facial repairs on children using conscious sedation with ketamine,
performed lumbar punctures on sick kids at a childrens hospital
admited pts to the icu and followed them while there,
taught my intern on the im service how to dictate, suture, draw blood and start iv's( it was his 1st month out of school),
took q2 24 hr call at the busiest trauma center in washington dc for 5 weeks,
got certified/credentialed( or recertified in some cases) in acls, pals, nals, phtls, and atls
in addition to a variety of other tasks/procedures.
so yes, pa students get to do what md students do. the md students do it for 2 years though while we only do 1.