How to Become a Physician Assistant If You Already Have a Bachelor Degree

Physician assistants (P.A.) are health care professionals that are licensed to practice medicine under the supervision of a physician. Career outlook for physician assistants is very good, and the wages can be as high as 100.000 USD or more.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

1. Before applying to P.A. school, try to have some work experience in health care:work as as nurse aide or do some voluntary work in a hospital.Try to obtain a couple of good references, as you will need them to be admitted in the physician assistant training program.In the same time, complete the prerequisites: usually anatomy 1&2 with labs, chemistry, microbiology, english ,are required, but be sure to double check.You need to have good grades, as most of the physician assistant schools are very selective with the applicants.

2. If you already have a bachelor degree, the next step is to find a physician assistant training program and apply to it.There are currently many programs, most of them are graduate programs that lead to a master's or doctorate degree, but some of them are associate degree programs.The training takes up to 2 years, excluding the time required to complete prerequisites.

3. Once admitted in the physician assistant program, be prepared.Most programs are full time, and are very demanding, almost like medical school.You can expect to finish your training in 2years.

4. After graduation, take and pass the NCCPA-administered Physician Assistant National Certifying Exam (PANCE).Every two years you must earn and log 100 Continuing Medical Education (CME) hours and re-register your certificate with the NCCPA.

Tips & Warnings

• a physician assistant can earn $100.000+ /year, a pretty good wage for an additional 2 years of training