Why do people recommend PA to medical students and premeds?

[libertyyne]

@libertyyne

I am going to oversimplify the argument here: Do all (or almost all) US med students have the intelligence to get into PA school? Can you say the same for PA students if they want to get into US med school?

Sure, Most US med students could get into PA school. Not all PA students could get into medical school, a good chuck could tho. A large portion of the top 20 PA schools could probably get into medical school if they wanted.

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[W19]

Sure, Most US med students could get into PA school. Not all PA students could get into medical school, a good chuck could tho. There is probably a new DO school somewhere that would take em though.

I would say almost all (not most). But I agree with your statement overall.

 

[ThreeCheers]

lol, bro , Im an M1.

Showing overlap displays one key thing. a good portion of PA's from the top 20 PA schools could have gone to DO schools.
And by displaying keck's average I am showing that there is a good chuck of that class that could probably get into a DO school.

You insist that "a good portion" of PA students would have the stats for med school, but (as you said yourself) we don't know what proportion of students are included in the only stat that gives us an apples-to-apples comparison (MCAT scores). We just don't have the appropriate data to make any inferences whether PA students are academically on par with lower-tier med students, or vice versa.

I do agree that there are students that have PA school as their main career goal, and that there are plenty of good reasons to choose that route over med school. As for the second part of OP's question, my understanding is that PA students don't have nearly the same pressure to meet some arbitrary cutoff score on their boards. They are also allowed to take time off for medical or personal reasons in times of crisis, without it being considered a red flag that destroys their careers. I don't care for pissing contests, but I think it's pretty clear which type of school is harder and more stressful.

 

[VincentAdultman]

I don't know why PAs go to PA school but if you want to believe that it's because they couldn't get into MD school go ahead. I hope it helps make you feel good and validates your own life choices.

 

[libertyyne]

You insist that "a good portion" of PA students would have the stats for med school, but (as you said yourself) we don't know what proportion of students are included in the only stat that gives us an apples-to-apples comparison (MCAT scores). We just don't have the appropriate data to make any inferences whether PA students are academically on par with lower-tier med students, or vice versa.

I do agree that there are students that have PA school as their main career goal, and that there are plenty of good reasons to choose that route over med school. As for the second part of OP's question, my understanding is that PA students don't have nearly the same pressure to meet some arbitrary cutoff score on their boards. They are also allowed to take time off for medical or personal reasons in times of crisis, without it being considered a red flag that destroys their careers. I don't care for pissing contests, but I think it's pretty clear which type of school is harder and more stressful.

Here is another data point for PA's.
http://paeaonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/2013-Memphis-CASPA-Data.pdf

You are correct, there is not complete data to make a complete comparison. My contention was to merely disprove that no PA's could get into medical school. There is clearly a subset of PA's that could get into DO schools, maybe even MD schools in some lucky states. I am willing to bet that matriculants at the top tier PA schools would be able to get acceptances somewhere. Contrary to popular belief , not everyone wants to be a doctor.
Lets be frank here

The average score on the mcat is 500, you are saying that a majority of PA's couldnt score a 500 mcat. 37% of DO matriculants have a score of 500 or less.

 

[W19]

View attachment 225386
Here is another data point for PA's.
http://paeaonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/2013-Memphis-CASPA-Data.pdf

You are correct, there is not complete data to make a complete comparison. My contention was to merely disprove that no PA's could get into medical school. There is clearly a subset of PA's that could get into DO schools, maybe even MD schools in some lucky states. I am willing to bet that matriculants at the top tier PA schools would be able to get acceptances somewhere. Contrary to popular belief , not everyone wants to be a doctor.
Lets be frank here
View attachment 225387
The average score on the mcat is 500, you are saying that a majority of PA's couldnt score a 500 mcat. 37% of DO matriculants have a score of 500 or less.

No one says that...

 

[ThreeCheers]

GPAs are a meaningless comparison all around in my opinion. For example, an MIT engineering student with a 3.3 GPA is much more impressive than a 4.0 GPA journalism major at some middling state school.

I don't disagree that some (n=??) PA students could have gotten into med school, but it's not a very strong statement. I'm sure there are also nurses, admin, etc that could have been doctors if they wanted to. You don't have to convince me that there are plenty of reasons not to want med school.

 

[libertyyne]

No one says that...

job done then?

GPAs are a meaningless comparison all around in my opinion. For example, an MIT engineering student with a 3.3 GPA is much more impressive than a 4.0 GPA journalism major at some middling state school.

I don't disagree that some (n=??) PA students could have gotten into med school, but it's not a very strong statement. I'm sure there are also nurses, admin, etc that could have been doctors if they wanted to. You don't have to convince me that there are plenty of reasons not to want med school.

You must have a very low opinion of PA's if you think a good chunk of them couldnt get between 489-500 on the mcat.

 

[Stagg737]

1. Sure I am being generous with numerous, the point is that the median mcat for DO schools is 502, Unless you have a better way to rank .Literally no ranking I have seen puts Keck at the top of the PA program.

2. My point is that lets not **** on PA's by saying a majority of them went to PA schools because they couldnt get into medical school. The comparison of keck , or any top 20 PA school is sufficient enough to prove that they have the academic chops to go to a DO school.
3. You have no data to support that Keck is the most competitive PA school.
4. The point is that there is overlap, the degree of overlap can be debated. So lets not just **** on PAs.
5.Your fourth point makes no sense. We are talking about academic chops of people going to different programs.

Showing overlap displays one key thing. a good portion of PA's from the top 20 PA schools could have gone to DO schools.

Here is the image of matriculants, it bode any better.
View attachment 225376
This chart from caspa below literally says that they are not applying to DO or MD schools at the rate you are talking about.


View attachment 225377

I am Merely disproving the ****ting going on in this thread that "PAs are people who couldnt get into medical school" And by displaying keck's average I am showing that there is a good chuck of that class that could probably get into a DO school.

1. That's fair, at least now you're comparing two stats that are more reasonable. However, it's still only a mediocre comparison as you're comparing a single school to the entirety of DO applicants/matriculants. Idk how you'd rank PA schools. PANCE scores?
2. Not crapping on PAs, and never said the majority went to PA school because they couldn't get into med school, but more than a couple certainly do. If you want to look at it that way though, how many people do you know that went to med school because they couldn't get into PA school?
3. I never said it was the most competitive, just that it's one of the more highly ranked ones based on people I've talked to from out west. You also have no data showing it's not one of the better ones and have said so yourself it is, so I don't know why you hyperbolized my statement. The point I was trying to make was that Keck pulls largely from the most competitive group of pre-med applicants (Cali pre-meds), so the fact that their applicants have decent MCATs doesn't mean that all PA schools do, it means they're coming from a region where a 27 isn't competitive for med school.
4. That's fine. Again, don't know why you think people are crapping on PAs. The fact is many of them aren't competitive enough to go to the vast majority of med schools, many are. That's not really news to anyone.
5. You were talking about overlap and that by showing there's "some overlap" means your statement must be true. I gave a hyperbole to show you how ridiculous that line of thought is, especially given that you're using parameters (MCAT) that aren't consistent within the 2 fields at all. The point is there's no real way to compare the standards for the two fields because their admissions requirements are so different. The best way might be sGPA, but I've seen no documents at all which include PA admissions as a whole.

As for the CASPA chart, does that include people who ever applied to MD/DO programs, or just ones who applied to other fields in that same cycle? Because those are two very, very different things and I know literally no one who applied to PA school in the same cycle as med school (the ones that failed to get into med school applied for PA school in later cycles). Context matters.

job done then?

You must have a very low opinion of PA's if you think a good chunk of them couldnt get between 489-500 on the mcat.

Nice, you did your job and proved a point that no one was debating. Also, at no point in any post did anyone say a fair number of PA's couldn't get above a 490 on the MCAT. You're reading between lines that aren't there and are making strange comparisons that really have no relevance to the points you're trying to make. PA's are generally smart people who perform a much needed service and many could probably get into some med school, and I haven't seen anyone on thins thread make that argument. However, going back to the original question asked, the requirements for getting into PA school (other than clinical hours required) and the difficulty of PA school is a lower standard than both MD and DO schools.

 

[libertyyne]

Nice, you did your job and proved a point that no one was debating. Also, at no point in any post did anyone say a fair number of PA's couldn't get above a 490 on the MCAT. You're reading between lines that aren't there and are making strange comparisons that really have no relevance to the points you're trying to make. PA's are generally smart people who perform a much needed service and many could probably get into some med school, and I haven't seen anyone on thins thread make that argument. However, going back to the original question asked, the requirements for getting into PA school (other than clinical hours required) and the difficulty of PA school is a lower standard than both MD and DO schools.

I linked the document where the spga of PAs was included.

Maybe I am misreading statements like the one below, but the implication is that most PA's are failed DO applicants.

Your argument certainly sounds like one made by a premed. To show that two groups are similar you need to establish a normal distribution of scores for each group then determine equivalence through inferential statistics. Instead you picked two arbitrary datasets, assumed equivalence and made a subjective inference. You then did the same with two separate groups of medical students.

In the end scores are just one aspect of an application. As I have already stated, many of the PA students at my school's program were encouraged to apply after failing acceptance to our DO school.

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[HueySmith]

At my school, the average gpa of matriculating PA students is higher than that of DO matriculating students

 

[libertyyne]

@libertyyne

I am going to oversimplify the argument here: Do all (or almost all) US med students have the intelligence to get into PA school? Can you say the same for PA students if they want to get into US med school?

It's time for med students and physicians to stop being afraid of not offending people. We are being run over by EVERYONE.

Our training is superior, medical school is harder, we have more autonomy, and people should go to physician practices for care. I only said lines get blurry when you start talking about DO admission metrics and PA admission metrics, where it is not clear cut.

 

[cbrons]

This, and the difficulty of getting in and getting through it are about just as hard. Just shorter.

Obvious troll is obvious.

 

[Stagg737]

I linked the document where the spga of PAs was included.

Maybe I am misreading statements like the one below, but the implication is that most PA's are failed DO applicants.

Didn't realize that was a national number and thought it was just for Memphis. Context matters, so that now makes more sense.

I wouldn't read into that statement as much as you are. As I've been saying, just because something is true at one school doesn't mean it's meant to be extrapolated. It's just an example that it's true in some situations, like some PAs would do just fine getting accepted to and during med school.

Our training is superior, medical school is harder, we have more autonomy, and people should go to physician practices for care. I only said lines get blurry when you start talking about DO admission metrics and PA admission metrics, where it is not clear cut.

Because they're not really comparable. PAs don't need to take the MCAT (or any standardized test at over 50 schools), typically require more clinical work, and focus less on academic performance in terms of minimum standards. DO schools typically have the same metrics as MD schools even if they're not always as high in terms of standards (minimum MCAT, minimum GPA, displays leadership/EC experience, some shadowing, some form of clinical exposure). Here's a link to national PA program directory if you want to play around with which programs require what: PAEA Program Directory

 

[DoctorCrush]

Lol I have the hours. But my stats would probably not get me into a PA school even though I have two DO acceptances.

 

[857770]

There are people whom have gotten into a medical school, but rejected from a PA program. In fact, it was mentioned on SDN. And the rejection did not have to do with clinical experience.

Some PA schools are only interested in academics and not clinical experience. And there is a debate among PAs on whether or not this is good.

You can't compare the two because the admission requirements are completely different. If anything we could compare PA with Vet because they both take the GRE.

If we say that getting into PA school is easier because of the GRE. Then we have to say that getting into VET school is easier than getting into Med school; pre-vets take the GRE. And we know that it is not easier to get into VET school.

 

[IsWhat]

My wife is a PA who attended a ~top 2-3 program in the country and I got to know her classmates well. I can say without a doubt the majority of her class were intelligent enough to get into medical school if they wanted. The common theme among them was not wanting the responsibilities of being a physician.

I’m also going to disagree (to some extent) with people who think medical school is harder than PA school. Medical school is harder in the sense that it is longer with the additional stress of multiple board exams, but the week-to-week intensity and grind of schooling is about the same from what I’ve seen and experienced. Actually, some of my worst weeks haven’t even come close to some of the weeks my wife had to endure in PA school.

 

[ERDOC555]

The argument that PA school is "hard" because you see stressed out PA students or because they tell you it's hard is ridiculous.

When PA students are forced to memorize HLA markers for specific diseases, lysosomal storage diseases, and all the other minutia that medical students have to learn on a daily basis, then maybe they can say their curriculum is as hard. At the end of the day, they learn the bare bones, basic, easy stuff that med students learn at the beginning of each block. They don't have nearly the same depth of material that we cover and it would be laughable to think that they do.

I would guess that they cover well below 50% of the material that we do in 2 years in their 1 year. I bet if you gave First Aid to any PA student they wouldn't be familiar with most of it.

 

[ivorychins]

The argument that PA school is "hard" because you see stressed out PA students or because they tell you it's hard is ridiculous.

When PA students are forced to memorize HLA markers for specific diseases, lysosomal storage diseases, and all the other minutia that medical students have to learn on a daily basis, then maybe they can say their curriculum is as hard. At the end of the day, they learn the bare bones, basic, easy stuff that med students learn at the beginning of each block. They don't have nearly the same depth of material that we cover and it would be laughable to think that they do.

I would guess that they cover well below 50% of the material that we do in 2 years in their 1 year. I bet if you gave First Aid to any PA student they wouldn't be familiar with most of it.

Yet, it's much harder to get into PA school than pharmacy school. Seems backwards tbh

 

[IsWhat]

The argument that PA school is "hard" because you see stressed out PA students or because they tell you it's hard is ridiculous.

When PA students are forced to memorize HLA markers for specific diseases, lysosomal storage diseases, and all the other minutia that medical students have to learn on a daily basis, then maybe they can say their curriculum is as hard. At the end of the day, they learn the bare bones, basic, easy stuff that med students learn at the beginning of each block. They don't have nearly the same depth of material that we cover and it would be laughable to think that they do.

I would guess that they cover well below 50% of the material that we do in 2 years in their 1 year. I bet if you gave First Aid to any PA student they wouldn't be familiar with most of it.

I would say this number is closer to 70-75%. PA school cuts out almost everything that isn’t clinically useful (which is some of the hardest stuff to learn TBH), but I was pretty shocked by how much my wife was being taught. Honestly, the biggest deficit to PA training is probably how quickly they go through the material - not the breadth of the material. There is really no way to retain everything they learn in two years.

Residency training is the great separation between our professions. If you think the didactic education PAs receive is vastly inferior to medical school you are mistaken.

I’m an M2 by the way.

 

[Lnsean]

lol..are people really debating this? Come on. Med school is much much harder to get into than PA school. The applicant pool is on a whole different caliber. Jesus christ...I know a ton of people that got into PA programs that could not get into any medical program. I feel like with our generation of participation trophies and refrigerator magnet smiley faces that everyone is butt hurt for some external validation.

 

[Deecee2DO]

I would say that if you can't get into medical school go to pod school or optometry school. All that hard pre-med work to be a PA would just be disheartening IMO. Yes you have to take the MCAT to go to pod school, but your score really doesn't need to be that high, and the OAT is easier than the MCAT. Also, why do I find it hard to believe that medical school and PA school are similar in rigor? I believe that dental/pod are more than likely similar in rigor, but I find it hard to believe PA is. The degree is Physician's "Assistant", why would someone's "assistant" have similar training. Would that be like saying that a paralegal has similar training to a lawyer?

 

[Stagg737]

There are people whom have gotten into a medical school, but rejected from a PA program. In fact, it was mentioned on SDN. And the rejection did not have to do with clinical experience.

Some PA schools are only interested in academics and not clinical experience. And there is a debate among PAs on whether or not this is good.

You can't compare the two because the admission requirements are completely different. If anything we could compare PA with Vet because they both take the GRE.

If we say that getting into PA school is easier because of the GRE. Then we have to say that getting into VET school is easier than getting into Med school; pre-vets take the GRE. And we know that it is not easier to get into VET school.

The difficulty with admission is for two different reasons though. Like you said, you can't really compare the rigors too well because of different admission criteria. The difficulty with both Vet school and PA is the number of applicants to number of slots. There's about 2.5 applicants/med slot, while there's over 3 apps/PA student slot. I've heard the same thing for Vet school, supposedly because there's so many applicants for the number of slots. However, looking at the stats it actually seems easier (similar GPA, averagish GRE, and 1.8 apps/slot). So I'm not sure where the more difficult part for vet school admissions comes in.

My wife is a PA who attended a ~top 2-3 program in the country and I got to know her classmates well. I can say without a doubt the majority of her class were intelligent enough to get into medical school if they wanted. The common theme among them was not wanting the responsibilities of being a physician.

I’m also going to disagree (to some extent) with people who think medical school is harder than PA school. Medical school is harder in the sense that it is longer with the additional stress of multiple board exams, but the week-to-week intensity and grind of schooling is about the same from what I’ve seen and experienced. Actually, some of my worst weeks haven’t even come close to some of the weeks my wife had to endure in PA school.

Are you talking about pre-clinical or clinical years? I don't really know what the clinical years of PA school are like, but I could see them being tougher, especially depending on the med school's rotations. I've never heard anyone say that PA pre-clinical was harder though, and have actually had PA friends tell me there's no way they could handle my school's curriculum/depth when talking about it.

lol..are people really debating this? Come on. Med school is much much harder to get into than PA school. The applicant pool is on a whole different caliber. Jesus christ...I know a ton of people that got into PA programs that could not get into any medical program. I feel like with our generation of participation trophies and refrigerator magnet smiley faces that everyone is butt hurt for some external validation.

Where'd that holier than thou attitude about not bashing other careers go. Sounds like someone is being a bit unprofessional

 

[Lnsean]

The difficulty with admission is for two different reasons though. Like you said, you can't really compare the rigors too well because of different admission criteria. The difficulty with both Vet school and PA is the number of applicants to number of slots. There's about 2.5 applicants/med slot, while there's over 3 apps/PA student slot. I've heard the same thing for Vet school, supposedly because there's so many applicants for the number of slots. However, looking at the stats it actually seems easier (similar GPA, averagish GRE, and 1.8 apps/slot). So I'm not sure where the more difficult part for vet school admissions comes in.



Are you talking about pre-clinical or clinical years? I don't really know what the clinical years of PA school are like, but I could see them being tougher, especially depending on the med school's rotations. I've never heard anyone say that PA pre-clinical was harder though, and have actually had PA friends tell me there's no way they could handle my school's curriculum/depth when talking about it.



Where'd that holier than thou attitude about not bashing other careers go. Sounds like someone is being a bit unprofessional

Dude, are you still butt hurt about what happened? I mean, you and your colleagues went into an MD forum...into a thread where OP asked specifically for an MD perspective...and started bashing MDs. You made up factoids on how DO students are more mature and have more life experiences and how MD students are test robots and socially ackward. I actually posted data from AAMC and AACOMAS showing matriculant ages that are basically the same. Your colleagues saying "You both forgot that md students are all kissesless virgins too smdh." There's definitely an agenda here. That would be the equivalent of me going into the DO forums and bashing DOs. Here, all I've said was that medical schools are harder to get into than PA schools and most people would agree with that.

Also, you should move on. I know you are still salty from what happened but there's no need to follow me around the internet; it's creepy.

 

[Stagg737]

Dude, are you still butt hurt about what happened? I mean, you and your colleagues went into an MD forum...into a thread where OP asked specifically for an MD perspective...and started bashing MDs. You made up factoids on how DO students are more mature and have more life experiences and how MD students are test robots and socially ackward. Your colleagues saying "You both forgot that md students are all kissesless virgins too smdh." There's definitely an agenda here. That would be the equivalent of me going into the DO forums and bashing DOs. All I've said was that medical schools are harder to get into than PA schools and most people would agree with that.

Also, you should move on. I know you are still salty from what happened but there's no need to follow me around the internet; it's creepy.

I'm not salty, and I'm certainly not the one feeling "butt-hurt". I was pointing out the hypocrisy of your statements given your other recent posts on professionalism and what you seem to think is "bashing". There was no bashing. There is no agenda. If you're under those delusions you should really take a step back and think about who has the insecurities you're generalizing to an entire profession. You also said more than "med school are harder to get into that PA schools". You said the people applying to PA school "aren't the same caliber" as med school applicants, sounds a lot like you think less of them than physicians, and if I use the logic you've previously followed that would be bashing. If you want to twist it or shift your logical perspective that's your own problem.

Lol at "following you around the internet", I was posting on this thread before you, if anything you've followed me. However, you've been the one to attempt to derail 2 threads in as many days, so I'll just remind you that derailing threads is a TOS violation and move on.

 

[Lnsean]

I'm not salty, and I'm certainly not the one feeling "butt-hurt". I was pointing out the hypocrisy of your statements given your other recent posts on professionalism and what you seem to think is "bashing". There was no bashing. There is no agenda. If you're under those delusions you should really take a step back and think about who has the insecurities you're generalizing to an entire profession. You also said more than "med school are harder to get into that PA schools". You said the people applying to PA school "aren't the same caliber" as med school applicants.
Lol at "following you around the internet", I was posting on this thread before you, if anything you've followed me. However, you've been the one to attempt to derail 2 threads in as many days, so I'll just remind you that derailing threads is a TOS violation and move on.

You're salty and defensive as af. If you want to comment about what happened earlier, you can directly message me or comment in the other thread. There's no need to follow me around and reply to my comments everywhere. Stop derailing people's threads.

You also said more than "med school are harder to get into that PA schools". You said the people applying to PA school "aren't the same caliber" as med school applicants.

They're not. The data already shows that. Admissions data is objective data.

I'm not salty, and I'm certainly not the one feeling "butt-hurt". I was pointing out the hypocrisy of your statements given your other recent posts on professionalism and what you seem to think is "bashing".

Move on and stop following me around and derailing threads.

 

[Deecee2DO]

lol I can always count on SDN threads to consistently turn into an argument/trolling site about trivial bullcrap

 

[William Shakespeare]

PA school is recommended because the job is similar and the admissions are more relaxed. It’s as simple as that. Not EASY to get in but EASIER to get into than med school. That’s not to say that every PA student is a med school reject because there is definitely many pros and a lot of incentive to become a physician assistant.

 

[857770]

As far as curriculum difficulty, the only people that really know are those that have done both programs.

Lets also not forget that there are now PA to DO bridge programs. Not many; but there will probably be more.

 

[Stagg737]

My wife is a PA who attended a ~top 2-3 program in the country and I got to know her classmates well. I can say without a doubt the majority of her class were intelligent enough to get into medical school if they wanted. The common theme among them was not wanting the responsibilities of being a physician.

I’m also going to disagree (to some extent) with people who think medical school is harder than PA school. Medical school is harder in the sense that it is longer with the additional stress of multiple board exams, but the week-to-week intensity and grind of schooling is about the same from what I’ve seen and experienced. Actually, some of my worst weeks haven’t even come close to some of the weeks my wife had to endure in PA school.

With regards to your second paragraph, are you talking about pre-clinical or clinical years? I don't know much about the clinical side of PA education, but every PA I've talked to has said their pre-clinical education sounds/was significantly easier than medical school due to depth of material learned.

As far as curriculum difficulty, the only people that really know are those that have done both programs.

Lets also not forget that there are now PA to DO bridge programs. Not many; but there will probably be more.

Are there any other than LECOM? I'd heard of that but I wasn't aware that it was actually becoming a bigger thing now...

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

Are there any other than LECOM? I'd heard of that but I wasn't aware that it was actually becoming a bigger thing now...

Pretty sure it’s just LECOM.

 

[Foot Fetish]

I used to be dead set on going to pharmacy school. I changed my mind at the last minute and pursued med school, which I am now crushing at an allopathic program where like half the class is made up of ivy league grads. This is just to say that it's not appropriate to make sweeping generalizations about the intellectual caliber of students who go into other health professions. There are pharmacists, PAs, and nurses out there who are smarter than your average MD. Not everyone pursues the most competitive thing they can just because they can.

While we're on this topic, it's also interesting to think that, just based on pure probability, the human with the highest IQ in history was probably not one of the famous geniuses you read about (Einsein, Newton, Da Vinci, etc.) but more likely some farmer in rural China who died in utter obscurity.

 

[857770]

We can't even compare Pharmacy with PA. Pharmacy schools require much more math. I think all of them require Calculus.

 

[mehc012]

I dunno, all of the PAs I worked with strongly advised me not to apply PA, even if I had to apply multiple cycles for MD. They just didn't think it would be as good a fit for me. I didn't ask them or anything, but we'd be talking about a case or a disease or a specific patient and they'd spontaneously tell me that I wouldn't be happy as a PA.

 

[GypsyHummus]

Idk, but if it was me, I wouldn’t want to be a PA, even if I had the stats for it. PA is fun and all in your early 20s and mid 30s; 80-125k salary, less responsibility, ability to switch specialties, hands on work, a 1/3 of the time for training, high demand, etc. The downside to PA is felt when you are 40+ and you are being bossed around by a 30 year old hot shot right out of residency doctor.

To me, if MD/DO we’re out of reach via MCAT or GPA (it’s getting harder to get into DO schools), I would go the DPM or OD route (prolly DPM before OD, as it offers a surgical aspect as well) as DCtoDO said. Even though pod and optom are considered “lesser” on the medical hierarchy, they still have independent practicing privileges and are fully trained for their respective specialty. Really, there is a lot of overlap in DPM training to MD/DO, 3 schools even take the same exact classes side by side with DO students.

But really the best profession is dentistry. Much less insurance headache, and they actually get paid for what they do.

 

[W19]

PA is good gig for the amount of training they have to go thru...

 

[GypsyHummus]

That can be said about any profession that isn’t MD/DO/DPM

PA is good gig for the amount of training they have to go thru...

 

[W19]

That can be said about any profession that isn’t MD/DO/DPM

Any profession! Almost 40% of Americans have a baccalaureate degree, but I think less than 10% of US are making six figure salary. If making money was that easy, our median household income would not be 59k/yr...

 

[68PGunner]

Personally, I will only recommend PA over MD/DO if you won’t matriculate to med school before the 35 year old cut mark plus or minus 1/2 years depending on your risk tolerance and desire.

 

[GypsyHummus]

I mean in healthcare. Anything non MD/DO/DPM can be completed in 4 years or less and make good money, as a profession.

Dentistry-4 Years- 140k/year

Pharmacy (if you can get a job)- 4 years- 110-130k/year

Optometry- 4 years - 80-120k/year

PA- 2 years - 80-120k/year

NP- 7 years- you can work and make money during training time. 50-120k/year

DPT- 3 years- 60-80k/year

Occupation Therapy- 2-3 years - 60-80k/year

What is a different story is debt associated with going these paths. This is where PA and MD school makes the most sense. PA because it’s only 2 years and MD because they can specialize in those high paying fields. 300k in debt isn’t bad when you are making 500k/year as an Ortho bro.

Any profession! Almost 40% of Americans have a baccalaureate degree, but I think less than 10% of US are making six figure salary. If making money was that easy, our median household income would not be 59k/yr...

 

[moisne]

Honestly, this sounds like a "whip it out and compare" contest.

Some/most PA's have inferiority complexes

And some/most MD's have superiority complexes/God complexes/arrogant dicks.

DO's alternate in both pools.

So let's stop comparing our junk sizes - no point.


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[anbuitachi]

Lol this thread is so sad. A thread full of misinformation and people with hurt egos..
Someone trying to make a point by showing overlap between a higher end PA school and a DO school (which is one of the lowest you can go to become a doctor..). It's as if other people didn't know there are PAs out there who couldve gotten into med school? Yea sure top tier PA school overlaps with bottom med schools. Going to PA school is a popular route for those who fail out of med school. How often do you hear of people failure out of PA school to go to med school? But still many people become PAs because they want to be PAs and couldve gotten into med school too if they put in the requirement/effort for mcat, etc

In the end, PA is an amazing profession. If i could redo my choices and go back 20 years, I would go to PA school. Why? Like many stated, easier to get into, still significantly involved in medical care, high pay right out of school, and good work life balance. Our institution have a lot of PAs straight out of PA school, so you have these early 20s kids making ~100k, working 40 hrs a week, with very minimal responsibilities. Put it in a calculator and you realize their lifetime per hour net income doesn't differ that much from a IM doc.

 

[anbuitachi]

I mean in healthcare. Anything non MD/DO/DPM can be completed in 4 years or less and make good money, as a profession.

Dentistry-4 Years- 140k/year

Pharmacy (if you can get a job)- 4 years- 110-130k/year

Optometry- 4 years - 80-120k/year

PA- 2 years - 80-120k/year

NP- 7 years- you can work and make money during training time. 50-120k/year

DPT- 3 years- 60-80k/year

Occupation Therapy- 2-3 years - 60-80k/year

What is a different story is debt associated with going these paths. This is where PA and MD school makes the most sense. PA because it’s only 2 years and MD because they can specialize in those high paying fields. 300k in debt isn’t bad when you are making 500k/year as an Ortho bro.

PA is much shorter and i think there are bunch of programs that integrate it into college. Their debt is several times less.

Those are some underestimated salaries for Dentistry, pharm, opto, PA, NP. They all make more than that.

 

[libertyyne]

PA is much shorter and i think there are bunch of programs that integrate it into college. Their debt is several times less.

Those are some underestimated salaries for Dentistry, pharm, opto, PA, NP. They all make more than that.

I dont know where you are located, but having hired PA's, NPs in my previous job I know that those are reasonable ranges. Most of my pharm buddies also are in that range.

 

[68PGunner]

PA is much shorter and i think there are bunch of programs that integrate it into college. Their debt is several times less.

Those are some underestimated salaries for Dentistry, pharm, opto, PA, NP. They all make more than that.

Those numbers look right to me if you are an employee of a practice.

 

[Ho0v-man]

PA and med school apps are really just very different beasts. I was originally pre-PA and I can only speak to my own experience, but I would have had no problem getting into just about any PA program I wanted to get into.

The programs that require the GRE (roughly half of them) do not have a particularly high requirement. In fact, it’s usually pretty low (50th percentile).

Furthermore, they have a huge focus on healthcare experience to the point that a subpar applicant could really just take another year and keep working to be more competitive by literally just putting in time.

Med school on the other hand considers a prior healthcare career to be about as beneficial as any other EC.

Also, despite having overall slightly lower gpa than DOs, PA matriculates typically choose easier undergraduate majors. PA also accepts a much larger percentage of applicants that apply.


Physician Assistant Education Association
Physician Assistant Education Association
http://www.aacom.org/docs/default-source/data-and-trends/2012-COM-AMProfile.pdf?sfvrsn=16

I had a very solid PA app and when I switched to pre med I thought that would translate to a moderately competitive med school app. I was very surprised that some DO schools wouldn’t even interview me. I’m sure there’s some small overlap just like there is between MD vs DO, but the big picture really is that most PAs never had an app for MD or DO.

 

[Coltuna]

Furthermore, they have a huge focus on healthcare experience to the point that a subpar applicant could really just take another year and keep working to be more competitive by literally just putting in time.

This is the biggest difference betwen what constitutes being a competitive applicant for PA vs MD/DO. You could have a 4.0 and 80th percentile MCAT/GRE, but if you don't have direct patient care, your chances of acceptance to PA school are very low. Most of us know the chance of getting in if you apply those numbers to a MD/DO cycle (in addition to other ec's of course).

 

[W19]

How difficult is the GRE compared to the MCAT?

Let's face it: Almost anyone can get a 3.4+ c/sGPA if you know how to work the system...

 

[Coltuna]

How difficult is the GRE compared to the MCAT?

Let's face it: Almost anyone can get a 3.4+ c/sGPA if you know how to work the system...

GRE is exponentially easier than the MCAT in my opinion. You really don't need to have a base knowledge to take the GRE.

 

[Ho0v-man]

How difficult is the GRE compared to the MCAT?

Let's face it: Almost anyone can get a 3.4+ c/sGPA if you know how to work the system...

It’s easier and since the average PA score is something most people can score cold it’s largely a formality. And only a little over half of programs even require it. So really anyone who gets a decent gpa from anywhere and does well in the pre reqs has the academic requirements for PA school. After that, just get a healthcare job and put in your time.

The fact that roughly half of PA programs require no formal standardized test of any kind and the overall gpa is on the lower side in easier majors means that it really is only modestly more competitive than the Caribbean med schools.

Edit: it is of course several orders of magnitude more competitive than NP.