Good to know. Do all PAs do them?
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Good to know. Do all PAs do them?
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deleted6669
Nope, they are optional. a few students/class do them. maybe 5-7% of all pa's.
some real masochists do more than 1. I have a friend who did gen surgery followed by c.t. surgery. it took him 2 residencies to figure out that he doesn't like working with surgeons...he now works full time in e.m.
there are new programs every yr and I think with the tendency for pa school applicants today to have less prior health care experience than older pa's that they will become more popular over time. I wouldn't be surprised if they were required of all pa's wanting to work outside of primary care within a decade. there is already a move within the national body that certifies pa's to introduce specialty exams in 2011 which will be "optional" (for now).
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deleted6669
there are also something like 5-7 PA/PharmD programs out there already.
here is one of them:
http://www.washington.edu/medicine/som/depts/medex/applicants/degreeoptions_pharmd.htm
here is one of them:
http://www.washington.edu/medicine/som/depts/medex/applicants/degreeoptions_pharmd.htm
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deleted6669
"clinical pharmacist".
can work clinically or in academics, has a doctorate no one will make fun of....and it only adds 1 yr of school to the pharmD(the clinical yr fulfills requirements for both clinical yrs so they just have to do the first yr of pa school extra.) 5 yr program after a bs so 9 yrs of school total.
can work clinically or in academics, has a doctorate no one will make fun of....and it only adds 1 yr of school to the pharmD(the clinical yr fulfills requirements for both clinical yrs so they just have to do the first yr of pa school extra.) 5 yr program after a bs so 9 yrs of school total.
I thought PharmD was 6 years post High school? Or is the program your referring to require a BS to enter? If so why would a person go 9 years for a PharmD /PA , could they not through medical school/residency with one/two more years?
PharmD is four years. Either BS + four or six years in a direct program. The problem is that to work outside of Walmart you have to do at least one year of post grad work. If you want to work as a clinical pharmacist in a specialty field you have to do another year of post grad work (at least around here). The argument has always been if you had the pre-reqs for pharmacy and PA school you could probably be done with medical school in less time. Its OK for pharmacists that want prescriptive authority, but in a real clinical situation you are going to do one or the other and the skill set you don't use will rapidly atrophy (in my opinion).
David Carpenter, PA-C
So, you're saying that PAs in primary care aren't doing residencies and specialty exams? If not, they should be. FPs do, why should PAs be any different?
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deleted6669
the focus of most pa programs( all but a few surgical and peds focus programs) is primary care already and our mandatory national cert exam is a primary care exam. we all have to recert in primary care every 6 yrs regardless of which specialty we work in. many pa's use fp specialty board prep materials for the exam(I know I did). the new specialty exams being proposed would be in addition to this primary care exam we all take anyway. any pa right out of school should be able to walk into a job in primary care (with adequate supervision) and start working day 1 as a safe beginner to the field.
As somebody doing med school, I can tell you you can't speed up the medical school curriculum. The fact that the didactic portion of PA school is shorter proves that they are leaving stuff out, not that they are going faster and covering the same material. Trust me, if you were covering all the material we're covering and trying to do it faster, you wouldn't want to be anywhere near this process. There's a difference between skimming over the top and going into detail. A lot of times, I wish we did more skimming over the top around here.
My pre-med school had different levels of prerequisite coursework. Some of the pre-meds didn't even want to take the most rigorous options.
At least PAs understand this. One of the greatest problems with some other mid-levels is that they don't seem to understand their own limitations. For that matter, it becomes a problem when physicians don't understand their own limitations. None of us can know everything. I can't believe that anybody would think that mid-levels practicing without some sort of physician support (I prefer to call it "support" rather than "supervision") is a good idea. A safety net in medicine is never a bad idea is it? We do have people's lives at stake after all. Having a physician on site or available for phone consult immediately at least gives you the opportunity to double-check something if you're unsure.
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I'm going to let all of you do battle over the NP vs. PA thing. I just wanted to say that I like the idea of PAs evaluating patients to keep low acuity cases out of the ED...
I think having a PA on an ambulance makes a heck of a lot more sense than having EMTs on there by themselves. Of course, they cost more too. What - about 3 times the cost of an EMT? 👍 👎
In the discussion of mid-level purview, it is important to remember that there are some things that clearly fall into the category of mid-level treatment - like everybody who walks in with vomiting and diarrhea. This can be handled by any NP or PA. Doesn't require an MD at all. 
Feel free to mail in my comedian fee.
Feel free to mail in my comedian fee.Other than the above mentioned reason(dispo'ing worthless calls @ the scene), EMTs are perfectly capable of working on rigs. The entire purpose of EMTs is to scoop and run. You don't need a medical license to start IVs, get EKGs, or perform protocols. For the ~10mins a patient is riding in an ambulance an EMT, in contact with the ER, is more than sufficient care.
RGMSU, how many summers do MSI and MSIIs get off? How often are you in lecture/lab from 8a-8p x5 days a week? The MSs I know got their first summer off and are typically out of lecture by 2-3pm, and that's if they even ATTEND lecture, which few do.
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=675755
Instead of worrying about PA education perhaps you should turn your focus towards NPs who have ~90% online didactics and do a bunch of busy work like poster projects, writing pathophys papers, and essays on what their mother & grandmother did for menstrual cramps.
PAs atleast take gross, biochem etc. And I say all of this as a RN applying to PA school.
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deleted6669
try 5x the cost....
I'm not worried about PA education. I have more than enough to worry about with my own education. Those quotes aren't from me. As long as PAs are willing to be supervised, and I will get paid for supervising them, I happen to like PAs just fine. The mid-levels who don't want to be supervised are the ones that tick me off. And, please, my concept of "supervision" should be taken loosely. If you have a PA you can't trust enough to not be constantly looking over each other's shoulder, then it's probably not even worth it. As far as summers, I can say that we get MSI summer off. Beyond that, can't answer. I don't think MS2 summer is off actually. I will probably try to do an FM preceptorship this summer. Our lecture schedule is highly variable because we are on a "Block" and "Phase" system with info integrated around organ systems. Labs are what keep us up here in the afternoon more than lecture. We have an occasional lecture after lunch until 1 or 2. Frequently, though, lab will keep us up here until 4 or 5. We usually start at 9 and get an hour lunch, which isn't enough time to do jack. We usually get one afternoon off per week to catch up. Two days a week we are probably out by 3. Two days a week we are out by more like 5. They almost always keep us in lab until 5 on Friday - just another way they've devised to jab at us. I use weekends to catch up too. The only time I really "take off" is right after a test for a day or two. Otherwise, I would go insane. I can't speak to other health providers' education, but what they put us through in medical school really is not mentally healthy at all. Our "time off" is really time to study.
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Fair enough and I agree. I just didnt want you to discount PA didactics because they do 10-16 months vs. the 2 'years' med schools do. The hours spent covering material in those 10-16 months is probably not much shorther than the time spend in MS1 and MSII years (given 3 months off for summer first year and fewer lecture hours per week). I wont say its the exact same but its is more than sufficient.
Oh, so you were talking to me? Honestly, I think this is a bit silly. The people who've been to med school haven't been to PA school, and vice versa, so how can you compare the two? Secondly, who gives a crap? Besides educational differences, the role for a PA is pretty well defined by the name of their degree. People who get into the profession should understand that from the start, otherwise they shouldn't get into it. If they want to be a physician instead of a physician assistant or associate or whatever, they know where they need to go. My understanding is that most people who go to PA school understand what they're getting into and would prefer to have it that way. The people who are confused are those who think a PA is a pseudo-physician. They are not called a PP instead of a PA. See what I mean? I thought the person posting the thing about hours was saying that PAs are equivalent to MDs as evidenced by education, which is clearly untrue even by the law. That's what I'm referring to. I don't give a rat's butt who's in class for how long and how many months. That's all kid stuff. Docs are docs, and PAs are PAs. Everybody knows that when they sign up for their respective degree programs. Simple as that. You can try to convince the world that nurses are docs or PAs are docs or EMTs are docs or whatever based on such and such education, but nobody else is buying it. Everybody should just be proud of their own profession instead of trying to compare to everybody else.
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You need to rephrase your argument talking about NPs, not PAs. PAs are not trying to say they have equivalent education to a MD. PAs are just saying that their education is very closely modeled after medical school. NPs are trying to say their education is equivalent to medical school.
Did I not say that about NPs? My thinly veiled comments about "mid-levels who don't want to be supervised?" Who exactly do you think I'm talking about there? They can say they are equivalent all they want to, but nobody believes it besides them. Look at employment patterns. How many NPs do you know getting hired by clinics to work for physician's salaries? I haven't heard of any. Second, their belligerence toward physicians has cost them more than it's gained them. Who has an easier time getting hired by a doc? PAs or NPs? Hmm... I'll let you think about that one. How many patients do you think are going to choose a DNP over an MD? Common sense really. They can call themselves "Dr." all they want, but when people hear the word "nurse" mixed in there and they see "DNP" instead of "MD," they'll know what's up. At least the kind of patients I'm looking to treat will.
I come from a very PA unfriendly and NP friendly area. I've had even trauma surgeons say they'd hire a new grad NP over an experienced surgical PA any day. Hopefully my area is pretty uncommon, but it really irks me.
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deleted6669
once again laur that's because you are in ohio, the WORST PA STATE IN THE NATION.
go to north carolina, washington state, maine, vermont, new hampshire, montana, etc and see who gets all the hospital based midlevel jobs.....
I would also add "laur" is "laur" , after reading her posts I simply refer to them as another "laur" response!
The hospitals around where I grew up in Maine are in a frenzy trying to find enough PAs to hire. Makes me excited to go back and practice there!
You live in (what sounds to me like) a weird area. Where I am, NPs are valued colleagues in primary care, out in the FP clinics and whatnot, but in the hospital I don't see very many of them...
EDIT: Wow, I could just read the rest of the thread, and save myself some typing. 😉
Depending on which way the wind blows, laur is NP friendly or unfriendly. It just depends on whether the sun is shining; the wind is coming from the east/west; the moon is in the seventh house; etc., etc. Whatever is most expedient for her, IOW.
Of course, she has to first get through nursing school to be an NP. Details, details...
Of course, she has to first get through nursing school to be an NP. Details, details...
Don't measure in years....I know med students must be smarter than that. PA school's average 111 weeks vs med school average 150 weeks. When you break it down into hours of training, it gets even closer.
Of course, this doesn't include the post doctorate training of a med student...nor the post graduate experiential learning of a PA.
I think that's the point people are trying to make. Time wise it's close, however I doubt it is close in terms of the amount of information you have to cover in that time frame.
Close but no cigar. Close time-wise huh? 4 years undergrad + 2 years master's vs. 4 years undergrad + 4 years doctoral + minimum 3 years residency. 6 vs. 11. How exactly is that close again? Oh, we need to do it by weeks right? Give me a break here. We just had one lecture at my school for all the lymphatic drainage of the body. One lecture. So, be careful when you judge the contents of a week of medical school. Might be a little more than you think.
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You're leaving out something here. Clinical years of med school. Residency. And since when does "post graduate experiential learning" get included in the time course of an education? So a nurse who has 20 years of "post graduate experiential learning" is an honorary physician? Makes absolutely no sense.
RGMSU,
Somehow I managed to miss this post. Please note that I'm very supportive of medical school education and wish you the best in your studies. However, a cursory review of the lymphatic drainage (one lecture) isn't terribly impressive. Do you really believe that others arent grappling with this information? Very, very basic stuff. You have a long ways to go.
As far as comparing PA school to MD....I personally don't care to have that debate. The quality of the education in each is largely influenced by the quality of the teachers and their instructional philosophy. It's my understanding that many schools share faculty and PA's and MD's often take the same courses, in the same classroom, amongst each other. Wicked Crazy Sh*&.
Continue to write.
Im just going to do my best to listen.
Keep the faith, L
I think you misunderstand what I was getting at. My point was in a sense law is correct. Medical school is on average 150 weeks, and PA school is around 112. That's fairly close in terms of length when you look at difference in schedules. But as you pointed out the contents are not even remotely similar, which I suppose I should have emphasized more in my original post. Again, I'm in your shoes RG, and I get where your coming from, I just didn't convey that very well in the post.
Hah, I thought this is what you were debating. I'm not sure you nor I know what you're even trying to get at here. First question - how many patients have you seen, and what is your contact with the medical profession that qualifies you to discern educational standards of medical professionals? Or is this all just academic for you, and your sole source of exposure is an internet website? Not exactly a wealth of experience in medicine. And, for the record, in medical school, we don't do anything in a cursory manner. When I said one lecture on lymphatic drainage, I said nothing about it being cursory. That's exactly the point about medical education - you cover a lot of detail very quickly, which is why measuring it in weeks really doesn't mean anything. The key question is - how much is covered in a week? A week in medical school is like a month in any other academic environment I've ever been in. Have you ever been in medical school? I doubt it.
No, he isn't correct. If the level of education of a PA were equivalent to that of an MD, PAs wouldn't need to be supervised by MDs now would they? Again, I'm not sure what medical school he's referencing, but my program is definitely longer than 150 weeks. Medical school is four years, not three. That's longer than 150 weeks. Leaving some of the clinical years out somewhere. And, by the time you tack on residency, MD training becomes much longer than PA training. I can't believe we're even discussing this. It's plainly obvious. Throw in residency and seven years minimum is much longer than 112 weeks.
I think it's pretty evident in the title that Physician Assistants are in fact just that. This has no bearing on the intelligence of either a Physician or a PA. I'm sure there are PA's that are smarter than Physicians (and v.v) but they just preferred not to deal with all that extra paperwork/liability that Physicians have etc. I say this because sometimes that's what people infer that just because you say their training is "inferior".
Everyone has pride for their training and education, and that is excellent because you want a good education and you want to be confident when treating patients. That said everyone has their limits. Yes, Medical Students even physicians. If you don't learn those limits you will find yourself in trouble. A Cardiologist should not be mucking around with a brain tumor, they should refer to the neurologist. And if the physician is unsure about drug-drug interactions they should talk to the pharmacist etc. The human body is just too complicated for anyone to try to know everything and it's too important to take gambles if your unsure.
To get back to PA/Phys. argument. Physicians are trained much longer than PAs. I imagine that PAs are well trained as well, but Physicians get a much longer, more focused training (esp. residency trained Physicians). That said, PAs probably have a better job and a less stressful life. No, having a higher salary does not make your life better or your job. Just think of it this way, if someone get's 100k just to walk in once a month and say hi and another person is pulling 60-70 hour weeks and runing around and lifting heavy things etc. and making 160k-250k. The latter is not exactly a better job. It's just a higher paying one.
Now can we put this silly war to rest?
There is no silly war. You haven't said anything I disagree with. This was never about PA vs MD. I have had conversations with several PAs on here who will tell you I am not anti-PA. This was about someone claiming that a PA education was essentially equivalent to an MD education, which is not true. There's nothing wrong with being a PA, but there's nothing about it that is equivalent to being an MD.
Again, I never said this, I agree the level of education is no where near the same. The point of my post was simply using time isn't a good comparison of the two.
The AACN's Essentials of Doctoral Education for Advanced Nursing Practice specify that programs provide "a minimum of 1,000 hours of practice post-baccalaureate as part of a supervised academic program".
Eeek. So a new grad BSN prepared RN can get their DNP with only 1,000 clinical hours?! I guess that is why they are equivalent to a physician 😕
Eeek. So a new grad BSN prepared RN can get their DNP with only 1,000 clinical hours?! I guess that is why they are equivalent to a physician 😕
PharmD/FNP and PharmD/PA doesn't make any sense to me why anyone would want to do that...
Laur, reading your posts is painful. You clearly have no idea what you are talking about as you AREN'T an RN or NP and have not gone through the training.
As far as people bad mouthing the DNP...not all NPs agree with it NOR are NPs getting it solely so they can be "equivalent" to physicians. Not EVERYONE wants to be an MD...sorry to crush your egos.
Most NPs don't view themselves as equivalent to MDs and see themselves rather as midlevel providers. I want a DNP personally for enrichment, NOT so I can call myself "doctor"...that would be a complete waste of money.
The fact of the matter is that "hours of training" doesn't equal a good provider, especially if a student is doing the bare minimum to get by. I'll admit I am a new grad RN that is applying to NP school, but there are some PGY-1s I deal with on a daily basis and I wonder how they EVER graduated from med school because they make the stupidest calls ever and make me have to call their senior/attending to get their mistakes corrected. As a new grad RN, I shouldn't have to catch mistakes or tell residents what to prescribe but I do...and it sucks.
That being said, 2nd and 3rd year residents are generally great and have realized they aren't God and have learned to appreciate the people they work with. I adore them 👍
Anyhow, schools of nursing do teach "nursing theory" but honestly I can't remember any of it because it was all in one class in my first semester. During medical/surgical nursing, peds, ob, etc. you learn about medical conditions and the medicine, surgeries, etc. to treat them and the rationale (at least at my school). I mean, how can you function as an RN if you don't know how a medication is going to work physiologically and thus monitor for adverse reactions? What do you people think RNs/NPs LEARN in school?
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deleted6669
I don't think anyone is calling rn training into question. rn's at the adn or bsn level are pretty much a known quantity; you know they will all know certain didactic material and procedures.
this is not true of np's because there are some really great programs out there that are 100% on campus with great clinicals, etc and then there are some that have 100% of the didactics online with rotations arranged by the student which may be of varying quality. if your uncle is your preceptor it's less likely they will fail you for a poor performance for example.
I have no problem with np's. what I do have a problem with is certain methods of educational delivery and assessment. a few pa programs are experimenting with a few online courses as part of their didactic yr and I am critical of that as well. a few pa programs require the students to arrange their own clinicals. not a big fan of that either.
I was just saying that 1,000 hours is the minimum for a BSN-DNP program, which seems very low in terms of clinical hours, especially since program don't appear to be high in the sciences either.
I'm not anti RNs or NPs. Trust me, I'm well aware of how hard ADN and BSN programs are. I'm standing here at work next to a new grad RN who I absolutely adore - she's wonderful. We just had a patient in the Trauma ICU crash and the Trauma NP responded. He was also absolutely wonderful. He said his background has a medic for 15 years helped out tremedously in his career as a trauma NP.
I realize I haven't been to RN or NP or PA school yet. So working in a hospital and talking to everyone I see and asking questions is as good as I can get for right now.
I'm not anti RNs or NPs. Trust me, I'm well aware of how hard ADN and BSN programs are. I'm standing here at work next to a new grad RN who I absolutely adore - she's wonderful. We just had a patient in the Trauma ICU crash and the Trauma NP responded. He was also absolutely wonderful. He said his background has a medic for 15 years helped out tremedously in his career as a trauma NP.
I realize I haven't been to RN or NP or PA school yet. So working in a hospital and talking to everyone I see and asking questions is as good as I can get for right now.
Hopefully, when a few PA programs go online, someone can do some research on their grads, especially if a program offers both routes.
I didn't have to pick my own clinical site but I chose to. How else could I select "US soil" in a foreign island country, lol!
There is at least one online PA program... UW-Madison. It would be interesting to compare their campus based graduates with their distance learning based graduates.
From the website:
The traditional program consists of twenty-four months of full-time didactic and clinical instruction and requires campus residency. Traditional students pay full-time university tuition.
From the website:
The traditional program consists of twenty-four months of full-time didactic and clinical instruction and requires campus residency. Traditional students pay full-time university tuition.
The distance education option extends the length of the program by one year and consists of 36 months of didactic study and clinical instruction. The didactic component is completed over the course of 24 months. Distance students spend the first summer in residence on the Madison campus and return to campus twice each semester for 2-3 days. The balance of didactic instruction is completed on a part-time basis in the student's home community through distance modalities. The clinical component consists of 9 months of full-time, community- based clinical instruction. While every effort will be made to place students in clinical sites near their home communities, final decisions for placement will be based on availability of qualified preceptors. Distance students will pay university tuition based on their part-time or full-time status.
