Physician Assistants: Commitment to collaboration and quality care

Time is truly of the essence in healthcare. With patients waiting weeks for treatment and providers working tirelessly, the nationwide provider shortage has been deeply felt by patients and providers alike. When there are not enough feet on the ground, hands trained and ready to serve or ears available to listen, where does that leave the state of healthcare? In desperate need of a solution, certainly.

This week, Oct. 6-12, begins the annual PA Week – a time when the role and contributions of more than 200,000 physician associates/assistants (PAs) across the nation are recognized with appreciation and esteem. As a rapidly expanding profession, their impact in healthcare over the past 60 years of service has left a lasting impression that only continues to grow each day, most notably as an integral part of the solution to the provider shortage at hand.

Asking nearly any provider why they chose to work in healthcare will elicit the same admirable core response: “to help people.” Sharing this response myself, I found a path to fulfill this desire by pursuing a career as a PA. Undoubtedly, PAs have helped people by providing quality care, significantly decreasing wait times and increasing access to healthcare.

In the PA profession, however, our mission “to help people” extends beyond the patient. Specifically, this includes the countless physicians and providers affected by the provider shortage.

PAs are extensively trained under the medical model to provide quality care in any specialty in collaboration with supervising physicians. This intrinsic physician-PA collaboration highlights a cornerstone of the PA profession: PAs function best as part of a team, which is equally true of healthcare as a whole. High-functioning teams recognize that teamwork is not only about working together to achieve a goal, but also about ensuring each team member has the support needed to serve at their best.

PAs have become the feet on the ground, the hands trained and ready to serve and the ears available to listen. They have answered the call to help people, not merely as a duty, but as a mission to make a deep impact on every infinitely valuable human life, both patient and team member alike. Healthcare professionals commit to upholding the dignity of the human person, meaning every person has a right to quality care and the presence of PAs has also upheld the dignity of the healthcare team members.

This PA Week, we focus on the past, present and future of PAs with great admiration and hope for the difference and promise they provide. Physician Assistants will continue to impact healthcare as they profoundly fulfill their roles. They are team players. They are caring providers. They are a mighty answer to a valiant mission.

By Danielle Blattman, a first-year PA student at Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Academy of Physician Assistants & American Academy of Physician Associates student member