Interview with Hardin Simmons Student and PAEA Fellow

Here's an interview with a PA student who is also a PAEA Education Fellow.

1) What made you decide to be a PA? 

I had always wanted to be in medicine.  I went to Texas Tech University HSC in Lubbock and got my undergraduate in Clinical laboratory science in 1994.  I thought that being a Medical Technologist would be a useful skill if I was able to go to medical school.  At this time I had not considered becoming a PA because, well, there were no PAs in Texas.  Dwight Deter would be issued license PA00001 in August of that year.  Shortly after graduation I met my future wife and moved to Virginia.  We would move back to Texas in 2001 but as they say "life happened".  Children and mortgages became the focus of my efforts.  During that time I spent a year as a stay at home dad and completed a Master of Education from Tech.  Twenty four years after graduation I was investigating and advanced degree in medical technology when I saw that Hardin-Simmons was beginning a PA program in Abilene.  My family and I live about an hour east of Abilene and my kids were in high school.  I didn't want to uproot them to pursue my dream but with the HSU program essentially in my back yard I knew that we could make it work.  Of course, by then, I had had a long history of working with PAs in clinical settings and was aware of their skill, training, and the excellent care that they provide.  

2)  How did you choose Hardin Simmons? What was interviewing like?

The decision to go to Hardin-Simmons was easy.  I had gone to Hardin-Simmons my first year out of high school and loved the quality if the school and the Christian focus involved around academics.  I was actually on the first football team when it returned to campus. I had left HSU because of family financial concerns.  I regretted not being able to finish my undergraduate there and being able to take a full advantage of all the University had to offer.  When I heard that the PA program was starting the choice was clear.  Returning would let me pursue a dream in medicine that I thought had long since passed me by.  It was a homecoming, of sorts, and I would not need to uproot my kids from where they had been going to school since kindergarten. 
The interview process was a journey.  I discovered the program in June I believe--a few months after CASPA had opened.  I put the application together, contacted my references, scheduled a retake of the GRE (it had been more than 15 years since I had taken it before) and sent everything in.   The program was great at staying in contact--something that we might take for granted in a newly started program who was working on admissions and getting the nuts and bolts of the program assembled.  When everything was completed I was offered an interview in January of the matriculation year.  It was VERY cold that day and the after-interview tour of the campus was cancelled.  I felt good about the interview but was incredibly nervous.  I interviewed with two faculty members in 1:1 format and a group interview with a PA from the community and a staff member.   I am actually finishing an ER clinical with the PA from the community right now, so it has come back full circle.  The interviews were relaxed and you could get a sense that this program was something special.

In didactic year it was simply the sheer volume of material to learn.  The "fire-hose" analogy undersells this if anything.  It is also more emotionally draining that I would have anticipated.  Most of the people in my class could easily be my children, but they are some of the best friends I have ever had.  Its not really about the differences between students, it is the common experience that binds us to one another and to other PAs who have had a similar experience.   In clinicals, it is the confirmation that we have the coolest job known to man and that all of didactic was worth it to get to this point.  I sometimes wish I had done this a long time ago, but my past experiences have made me who I am and the provider I hope to be.

3)  What study strategies worked? Did that change on rotations?

I had always had what I called a "photo-erratic" memory.  I could read chapter and see it in my mind, turning the pages and reading it again.  That was good for a good part of didactic but you will always need to adjust.  Pharm was a huge hurdle for me.  I had to change completely what I was doing, taking the PowerPoint presentations and creating question banks from them and drilling endlessly on the material.  I would say that what everyone should know about PA school is that you have to be adaptable.  If you are a loner, you may need to have study groups.  You may need to try a variety of methods and then pick the resources that are adaptable to that strategy.  Early on the problem was that there were TOO MANY resources and I could never get through them.

4) Tell me about your involvement and experience with TAPA.

I was elected as my class TAPA rep in the fall of 2017.  I was the first rep from HSU (there is a junior rep in didactic year and a senior rep in clinical year) so I needed to wear both hats to some degree.  TAPA is such a welcoming organization.  They listen to student input and we actually have a voice in its operation.  The conferences were fun.  It was a good experience to meet reps and students from other programs who had different experiences.  In the summer of 2018 I became the official Senior Rep.  I was also selected to be on the Legislative Affairs Committee (LAC) for the next year.  That was important to me because it was a legislative year in our biennial process here in Texas.  Medical Technologist are not typically involved in lobbying and career advocacy and that had been a area of concern for me.  What TAPA does for its members goes beyond advocacy.  It involves professional development, meeting colleagues and friends, and advancing our profession in ways that touches all of us in medicine--a field that is constantly changing.   In June of this year I was elected by my peers from the other programs as the Student Director for the 2019-2020 year.  I will be working with the SAC chair Kaylin Sallee as well as the reps from all of the programs to advocate for the PA students in Texas and to be their voice on the board.

5) Any plans for after graduation?

Absolutely!   Work and pay student loans!   

Seriously, I would like to one day become faculty at a PA program.  My prior degree in Education inspired me to become a PAEA Future Education Fellow.  I am doing this to see how the education principles I learned are applicable in a specific training environment like PA school.  I also no that before I am ready to do that on a serious basis that I need to be in practice and learn how to be a PA.  What I see ahead isn't the ending, it is a new beginning with new opportunities and challenges.  

6) What advice would you give an aspiring PA?

Know who you are and what you hope to get out of being a PA.  If it is money or lifestyle, you won't be happy.  Those are great benefits to becoming a PA but in and of themselves they are not enough.  You have to know who you are before you can become the provider you want to be.   PA school takes that core of who you are and refines it.  It makes it focused for service to our patients and for a lifetime of learning, sacrifice and struggles of one sort or another.  That said, I have loved every minute of it and can not imagine doing anything else.  The struggle is worth it.

Considering a Position, whether future, first, or further

Before I started this journey, I worked in recruiting. I helped people hire and get hired, walking through the steps of making a decision on a job. One of the key contributions I would make was helping people define what would make an excellent "fit." We usually think about money first, and then turn our attention to comparing exciting parts of different jobs. This can be a dangerously short sighted way to look at different positions, especially in your career as a PA. So, whether you have been a PA for decades or if you're nearly finished with school and want to look forward to something other than tests, here are some things to consider when considering a new position.

1) What is actually important to you? Our instant answer is money, but if you work 100 hours a week for it with no time off, you'll never get a chance to spend that money. Consider things like schedule, field, location, and team. Do you want to have more time off - maybe shift work is better. Does everyone else in your world live on a Mon-Fri 9-5 schedule? Maybe you should too. Do you really want to work in Neurosurgery? Do you want to be in pediatrics? Or do you just want to find a position near your family? Really figuring out what your priorities are will help you focus your choice.

2) Team - this is really critical. Finding a team that is right for you means you need to understand what kind of group you work well in. We often take for granted that everyone wants the same things, but there is a variety of nuance when considering who you work with. Do you function with more oversight? Do you need lots of clear expectations? Do you prefer more autonomy? Doe workplace humor help you or frustrate you? Culture and group fit are very personal, so consider what kind of mix works best for you.

3) Experience - as PAs, building good clinical experience is essential to having a strong career. When looking at positions, consider how much learning it will provide to you. Does this help you expand your portfolio of skills? Will you be exposed to different disease processes or patient populations? More importantly, does this experience help you build towards your future career goals? As PAs we can move from one area of medicine to another, so having solid experience can give you more flexibility in the future.

4) First Position - If you are making a decision about your first position, there's needs to be a few extra considerations. Have they trained a new hire before? What are the training and production expectations? Are there other PAs to help mentor you as you navigate they clinic or hospital? I have known some new grads who have successfully worked as the first PA in a clinic, but unless you are determined to do this I would focus on positions that have successfully trained new grad PAs already.

What job tips do you have? Any words of wisdom you've come across or had to learn the hard way? Let us know in the comments!

Interview with Emory Student

Here's an interview with a student from Emory who also has a neuroscience masters.

1) What made you decide to be a PA?
I decided to be a PA sophomore year of undergrad at UTD. I was originally doing a degree in neuroscience and thought medical school was my only option to be able to practice medicine, though I remember feeling less than excited about the career as a whole. I don't remember how I learned about it but as soon as I came in contact with the PA career I was sold. I knew that it would afford me the opportunity to interact with patients, practice medicine, and follow my passion of life-long learning. In addition, the biggest perk to me was the flexibility. The opportunity to practice in various specialities throughout my career as interests change or if I just felt the need for a new and different challenge 15 years from now continues to inspire me about the PA profession.
I also have had the pleasure of working with some wonderful PAs while I was doing intraoperative neurophysiology for spine surgery before PA school. I always looked at them with envy and couldn't wait to be in their shoes. Neuromonitoring was a great career but I missed the ability to have follow-up with the patients I saw. The full continuum of care was another aspect of being a PA that I felt I was missing. 2) Tell us about your first Masters degree.
My first masters degree was in applied cognition and neuroscience at UTD. It came about as an excellent opportunity where I could do a fast-track program and essentially complete the degree in one additional year. I absolutely loved the program and would find out a few years later that it made the neurology module as well as pharmacology go much more smoothly in PA school as a lot of the information was a second or third pass of learning at that point. 3) How did you choose Emory? What was interviewing like?
The short, and uninspired answer to this question is that it's the first school I was accepted to...but the more substantial reason is that i felt that Emory had an exceptional program with vast opportunities and I absolutely loved it as soon as I stepped foot on campus. Some of the high points of Emory's program include the anatomy course with gross dissection in a 6:1 ratio with classmates, the simulation labs including a Harvey simulator, and 1st year experience getting to do H&Ps in the hospital on patients with conditions that correlated with whichever module we were learning at the time. The program really gets the students involved early and helps to sort of get your feet wet before clinical year. In addition, Emory is committed to serving the community and I have had the honor of serving at the Good Samaritan clinic as well as a week long service project providing healthcare to the South Georgia farmworkers. Long story short, Emory's program is very well-rounded and it made it a very easy 'yes'.

They've done a great job of incorporating ultrasound lectures and hands on practice for each module and have a strong focus on point of care ultrasound, especially in performing an efast exam which I think is an extremely beneficial skill to being to the table.
The interview was great. It was one of the few that did laid back group interviews. There was no complex, stress-inducing, cow bell ringing and running from room to room like the multiple mini interviews. It was a simple conversation with a couple faculty members, a community PA, and a current student that was fun and surprisingly relaxing. 4) What has surprised you about PA school?
What has surprised me most is the incredible backgrounds that my fellow students have. It has been really awesome to be surrounded by people with such diverse prior jobs, career,s and outlooks on life. I've been able to learn a ton both academically and personally from my classmates which has been a great surprise. 5) What study strategies worked? Did that change on rotations?
Everyone studies a little different but what worked for me was before the start of each module I would watch the board review on that topic to get a broad first exposure to the information. Then with each PowerPoint lecture I would go home that night and take hand notes from them of what I thought was important. Then also supplement with information from readings to expand upon parts I felt I needed more details on or to help really understand the 'why'. I love using Ferri's clinical advisor as a supplemental resource. It's a great book that gets updated yearly. It has pretty short and sweet summaries of most diseases and gives basic info, epidemiology, diagnostic tests, treatment strategies, when to refer, and considerations. It was a lifesaver in didactic as well as clinical year. On rotations I primarily try to read up on conditions that I encounter in practice and then create a study guide based off of the PAEA blueprint for each end of rotation exam. It's quite a bit of work but has paid off nicely. I also spend a lot more time now doing practice questions through exam master and smarty-pance which really help to solidify the information and begin the prep for the PANCE.

6) Any plans for after graduation?
Hopefully take a vacation! But also studying for the PANCE-gotta earn that 'C' to make this all worth it. As far as a job goes, I'm on the search. I have loved a few rotations and think I know what I would like to do but will see how the job search goes and hopefully find the right match both personally and professionally.
7) What advice would you give an aspiring PA?
Advice I would give to someone who's considering or applying to PA school, I would say make sure you are going for the right reasons and ensure you're in a good place in your life to dive in. PA school can be pretty grueling and will test your limits mentally and emotionally and put a strain on your friends and family who may not understand your absence. Make sure you're going in to this because it's your passion because that love and grit may be the only thing that pushes you toward another day. But know that it gets better in clinical year; you just have to make it there! For those that are already in it. I know anatomy was one of the hardest courses and most time consuming but if you buckle down and spend the time on it now, learning disease processes and why they are occurring will be so much easier later. Also you'll look like a rock star when you get 'pimped' in surgery--and that will definitely be worth it

PA Life: Night Shift

Working night shift can seem daunting, but it has its advantages. Many PAs working shift work, especially newer graduates, end up working their share of nights. I've spent 6 years on nights, half as a PCT while getting my prereqs and half as a practicing PA Hospitalist. In that time, I've come to appreciate working nights. Below are some highlight and pits falls of working night shift.

Pro:

1) More Medicine, less bureaucracy - During a night shift, ancillary services like social work, case management, physical therapy, and to a degree administration are typically less available if at all. Trying to learn and navigate the complicated bureaucracy of medicine is less of an issue over night, allowing you the chance to focus more on evaluating, diagnosing, and treating the patient.

2) Flexibility - Shift work allows for some flexible schedules, and night shift can have even more. Often time, night shift is either required to work less shifts, get more compensation, or both. The trade off of working some weekends and holidays can give you long stretches of time off without using PTO.

3) Camaraderie - There's an inherent closeness amongst the teams at night, a sense of being "in the trenches" that develops. With some exceptions, you will find the common thread of working with less resources, less backup, at odd hours, helps unite the everyone.

4) Urgent and Emergent issues - You'll see plenty of this during the day as well, but over night you'll likely run into more if it. Decisions that need to be made quickly, interventions that need to be started, all with less support structure that day shift. If you're an adrenaline junky, night shift might be for you.

Con:

1) Sleep - The sacrifice you make from your sleep schedule will take a toll. There are studies showing the health effects you could suffer from working night shift. But even if you avoid these, your sleep will not be the same.

2) Social - While you might have time off work, most of your friends and family do not. Few of them will be off work when you do. Trying to schedule around nights, holidays, and weekends can be challenging.

3) Intangible - While you will be more connected to your nightshift team, you will often seem disconnected to the larger workings of your facility. You will miss meetings, you will struggle to make training sessions, you will be apart from much of the decisions made about your practice.


I don't want to end on such a negative note, because Night shift can be a wonderful fit for many PAs. On an upcoming post, I'll go over some of the ways to address these short comings and make the most of these benefits.

Do you work night shift? Any tips, thoughts, or hard learned lessons? Let us know in the comments!

Interview with PA-S from UNTHSC

Here's an interview from a PA student at UNTHSC who just graduated!


1) What made you decide to be a PA? I’ve always looked up to my own pediatrician growing up and truly appreciated how he treated my family and I so graciously. I aspired to serve others in that way and instill hope and confidence in children and their parents. I didn’t actually know what a PA was until I was in my second year of college and another student told me about it, sparking my interest. After some research into the career, I decided that this career path would fit my lifestyle better than going to medical school to be a physician. I would still have the wonderful opportunity to serve in pediatrics in the way I dreamed, however I would finish school faster and be able to have the family life I always envisioned for myself before the age of thirty. Felt like the perfect dream. 2) How did you choose UNTHSC? What was interviewing like?
Choosing UNTHSC was easy for me. My family is based in Fort Worth, so I was incredibly blessed to get in. I also thought the campus was pretty and nicely located in the middle of Fort Worth. The people had such a friendly vibe and I felt like it was easy to connect with everyone. Interviewing at UNTHSC was a little more intense than the interview at UTMB, but at the same time I felt more comfortable with the faculty. I remember I was in the afternoon interviews, so we had a quick bite to eat while sitting with faculty and other applicants. Then there was some sort of essay to write in a given time, a one on one interview with the faculty, and a team exercise with other applicants. It was stressful, but I tried to maintain my cool! That’s pretty much how everything went! It was all stressful, but then again I’m a worry bug. 3) What has surprised you about PA school?
Looking back on PA school, what surprised me was how hard it actually was. What also surprised me was how much you realize you are capable of learning! The learning curve applies to learning how to learn. Once you get your study habits on track, it goes much smoother. 4) What study strategies worked? Did that change on rotations?
During didactic, I realized quickly that my old study habits of making flashcards and reading were not going to cut it. I turned to my classmates for help and quickly realized that I needed a study buddy. I needed to review things out loud with someone to ensure that thought processes were correct and test one another to see multiple perspectives of the same material. I needed to see how the same information could be asked in different ways. I also used test banks like ExamMaster and books like PANCE Prep Pearls to figure out what were the main highlights and must knows within a topic. On rotations I had to fend for myself. I mostly used PANCE Prep Pearls book and ExamMaster to review material and topics. I also reviewed over old notes from didactic occasionally.
5) Tell me about your involvement and experience with TAPA.
TAPA was a great opportunity to do something outside of school with my classmates while also benefiting my career. My classmates and I always made a fun trip out of it and we got to see and meet students and alumni from other programs. It gave me a chance to learn about different career opportunities and practice communicating with other professionals. I think I went to at least one conference each year, if not two! It was fun to go to different cities and also to learn about what our career had to offer and what changes were being made. 6) Any plans for after graduation?

I found a job in primary care pediatrics! Start in August, so I have a couple months of lounging around and enjoying my last ever summer break!
7) What advice would you give an aspiring PA?
I would say that you should keep pushing through! All the hard work will pay off! Work hard to keep your GPA high in undergrad, volunteer, shadow, and don’t burn any bridges with anyone because you never know where a relationship will lead. Networking is key! I found my first job through my rotations! It is a great career and totally worth every moment of hard work!

Welcome Back

Welcome Back! 

We've been hibernating long enough. Time for some new posts! Stay tuned because we'll have new interviews from PAs and PA students, day in the life of snap shots, updates on the PA admission process, and more.

Have something you want us to cover? Any field of medicine you are curious about? Have a question about a particular school? Let us know in the comments!