One of the things I noticed is that PAs are becomng more and more commonpllace.

That's Physicians Assistants that I am talking about.

I first used the services of a PA in about 1980 and have appreciated them ever since. The first ones for the most part were military trained at Ft. Sam Houston. Top shelf medics most likely began the program years before that.

Some of them were real characters.

The first couple I met had recently retired from the Army and  were ideal for where I first met them. They were in Alaska and a lot of their clientele were what they had dealt with in the service, young men between the ages of about 18-45.

We were young and resilient and healed fast. The guys loved them for their no nonsense attitude and didn't mind their informal nature at all. I was once diagnosed with my PA telling me, "You got the crud."

Needless to say, there were a lot of people that were appalled to find they had no medical degrees. Other people sometimes mistook them for being former basic medics which they were certainly not by any means. They had extensive training at Ft. Sam and I know it was well over a year at the time. It's a lot more difficult now.

Even back then these men were very competent in their field. They knew how to treat most routine medical problems and equally as important when to send someone up the chain to an MD.

The medical trade took one look at these military medical people and decided they had a home in the medical business. An awful lot of things that doctors used to do didn't require all the years of medical school. The responsibilities could be pushed down safely.

Over the years it appears that the PA requirements have grown a lot more stringent and from what I have seen many of them now have specific areas of expertise. 

I had no problem with the early PAs and I have no problem with the newer breed. If they are in their comfort zone they are every bit as good as a fully licensed MD. I know that if they find something out of their comfort zone they will 'kick it upstairs' in a heart beat.

Still a lot of people get all worked up when they arrive at the doctor's office with a common cold and are assigned a PA to handle it. They shouldn't feel that way. If they have something serious the PA will send their case up the chain to the appropriate specialist.

Personally I think that being treated by a PA is a good thing. It's when the PA assigns me to a specialist that scares me because it likely means I have something serious







To find out why the blog is pink just cut and paste this: http://piccoloshash.blogspot.com/2009/12/my-feminine-side-blog-stays-pink.html NO ANIMALS WERE HARMED IN THE WRITING OF TODAY'S ESSAY