Paramedic looking to transition into PA/MD

[Cyronious]

Good evening everyone,

First off I apologize for another one of these redundant "I am a medic but now what posts". I have scanned over several the past few hours and although I learned quite a bit from reading through them, I still felt the desire to hear more opinions.

I am currently a 25 male and will be married next summer. I have been in EMS for 4 years, 3 of them as a paramedic in Oregon in Washington County. Through the past few years my love for medicine has amplified immensely. My father was a firefighter, and although I still occasionally test for local departments, my true passion lies in medicine and not in fire.

I love working as a paramedic and love having the opportunity to work with patients, see the different types of illnesses, and being able to treat said patients under the standing orders. However, due to the usual complains (long hours, poor pay, etc etc) I am realizing that this could not be an actual career for me.

One reason I was driven away from going into a paramedic bridge program into RN (which is fairly common for medics) is I just couldn't stand having to play the "mother may I" game when it comes to treating patients. I love having the opportunity to understand the dynamics of the patient and what is going on behind their complaint to choose which treatment option will most benefit the patient. I don't feel that I could deal with needing orders to perform interventions.

While pay is important to me, the fact of the matter is to me anything above 80k is wonderful and more than enough to support my family with.

Education wise, I currently possess an associates degree and am planning on going back into school to knock out some basic pre reqs for further medical schools (chem, bio, etc).

I like med school due to having the opportunity to really dive in to everything medicine has to offer. Right now whenever there is something I don't understand while working as a paramedic, I spend a few hours learning all I can about the subject hoping to retain it for the next opportunity that I run into it. My hesitation I have about medical school is the time constraint and the financial burden. My fiance' and I own our own home, two vehicles (car payments), and want to have a family. Also, ideally I would not want to relocate, limiting me to only a few schools in the Portland area (I currently live in Hillsboro, OR). I love the emergency medicine aspect and my ideal location would be in an ER at a level 2 or 1 hospital or as a cardiologist and diving head first into everything cardiovascular related.

PA would be a shorter time frame and less of a financial burden. What I hesitate about the PA route is that I hear that some PA go into the field and want more (similar to what I am experiencing now as a paramedic).

Overall I feel that I would either which way I went. I would love the challenge of going into medical school and having the opportunity to learn everything there is to learn about medicine. With that being said I do not want to put a burden on my fiance with finance (she only makes around 30k a year). I feel that I would love having the opportunity to work as a PA and being able to take a bite into the large pie of medicine and do more than what I currently do. But once again I hesitate due to the fact I am afraid that being a PA "wouldn't be enough" and I would find myself bored doing the same thing over and over again. I don't want to wait until I am 40 to have a family and that is another fear I have if I went into medical school.

So... what I am looking for is any past experience and advice people have with making the decision. I would really like to hear how those with families were able to handle the transition with medical school. How is the burden when it comes to finance?

Thank you all so much for any input or help you may have!

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[W19]

Shadow PA and MD/DO.... Also , talk to them as well because the last thing you want to do is that getting a PA degree and not be happy with the role of a PA... PA are very limited in surgical specialties as you probably know... However, med school is VERY expensive and lengthy, so you should not take that decision lightly...

 

[alpinism]

Agree with the above.

You need to shadow and talk to current emergency/cardiology PAs and MDs.

In the end, only you can decide if being a PA is "enough."

I will say this though, if your main interest in medicine is just seeing patients, diagnosing them, and performing procedures, PA might be enough. However, if you also want to learn medicine in great depth and have full responsibility for patients, then it might not be enough. Same goes for if you want to do research and improve medical care for patients.

By far and away the PA is the easier and faster option. Its also better financially in the short term.

Finish your BS with pre-reqs, go to PA school, graduate, and start working in 4-5 years.

Med school will require finishing the BS with re-reqs (more now with the new MCAT), then studying for the MCAT, then applying to multiple schools (depending on your GPA/MCAT), then going to med school, then residency. You won't start working as an attending for another 9-12 years.

On the bight side there are 2 DO schools in Oregon/Washington that are relatively easy to get into (3.3+ GPA and 26+ MCAT should be competitive) so you wouldn't have to leave the area if going DO is okay with you.

 

[Cyronious]

Thanks for the replies. Is there a vast different in DO/MD?

My main goal is to be in the ER or be specialized in cardiology regardless of what route I decide to chose.

 

[W19]

Thanks for the replies. Is there a vast different in DO/MD?

My main goal is to be in the ER or be specialized in cardiology regardless of what route I decide to chose.

Not a difference in term of practice scope: DO = MD in all practicality, but going to DO school might somewhat put you at a disadvantage in term of getting into competitive specialties and/or residency... EM/IM is very DO friendly, but cardio might not be...

 

[pamac]

Med school sounds like what you want to do, and it sounds like you have the drive, which is a large part of what it takes. I am a nurse working on my NP, and work with a resident that I knew in undergrad. We had the same grades, and pretty much the same circumstances. (Actually, this resident went ahead and started a family back then, and it took me a while longer.) This individual has many kids now, and is gearing up to be cut loose to start independent practice. They will be very in demand, and although this resident has bills to pay back, it's all downhill from here. I wouldn't trade places because I appreciate my path, but I'm also not the kind of person that gets bent out of shape with hierarchy issues... I'm like being good at what I do, and figure everyone has their own boss they answer to. The money is better as a doc, but I could have been well off working in the family business instead of what I'm doing. Also working near to me is an attending physician that I went to high school with that graduated in my class, so I guesse there are two decent examples of where I could have been in my career.

So I see what I could have been had I not decided to pursue a few other things along the way instead of maintaining my very brief focus on becoming a physician for the one semester I considered it. My friend is no worse for wear. I get to see that person in training and they seem to enjoy it. It does seem that they are ALWAYS at the hospital, and under significant commitments as far as time. Financially, I'm currently better off than my college friend, but that probably won't be the case once they are being recruited heavily to join a practice. I've probably had much more free time over the last decade than my friend, but I'm convinced that if someone is efficient, they can get in the things in life that are really important.

One of the things that it may come down to for you is this... I have never stood back and longed to be top of the heap, aside from wanting to be respected for doing a good job at what I've taken on. I clock out and go home and leave work behind, unless I get sucked into a brief emergency along the road or at an event where a health issue requires some basic first aid (extremely rare and barely worth mentioning). If you have the slightest notion that you will crave something beyond being a PA, then that's a good sign you probably will regret not taking the challenging route.

 

[pamac]

Additionally, it's not hard to cut the fat out if your day to make time for important things. I cut tv out of my day, and I get so much done that it's amazing to me what I accomplish. That's not to say you can work durring PA or med school, but you won't miss out on things that are truly important.