It’s All About Specialization…
At the presenters’ Q&A in Long Beach a few weekends ago, one of the questions posed to me (as the “young guy”) was “how did you get to where you are at such a young age?”
I gave a response about getting my 10,000 hours (Outliers reference)in early in my career thanks to some chance occurences [...]
August 17th, 2009 at 6:54 am
How does a Physician Assistant go about receiving specialization in a certain area?
For example, dermatolgy. What is the process?
I know that in order to become a PA you have to get your master’s and whatnot. But what about specializing?
I’m not asking for a short cut.
I’m asking how I go about specializing.
Educated answers only, please.
August 17th, 2009 at 11:56 am
It’s the same and sometime more for specialized field. There’s no short cut to becoming medical specialist because you could have someone’s life in your hand. I certainly want you to be properly schooled and trained if you ever become my specialist doctor or PA.
References :
August 17th, 2009 at 11:58 am
Depending on which area you want to work in may or may not require specialized training. For example, if you want to work in Dermatology, I’m pretty sure you may already be equiped right out of graduation for the job, but if you wanna do something like cardiothoracic surgery (approx $ 93,000/year) then you will definately have to do the "fellowship" for 2 years after graduation.
How do you go about it ? There are hospitals that do PA "fellowships" that fine-tune you in specialized fields. These "fellowships" usually range from a period of 1 to 2 years after graduation.
The good thing about PA is that you can move around doing different fields if you get bored doing the same thing over and over again.
The not so great thing about a PA is that you are basically doing the job of a house doctor without getting the salary of a doctor and you have to take the test every 6 years.
References :
I work in the healthcare field and have friends/coworkers that are PA’s