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When I graduated from high school, I had felt liberated, but also lost as I realized that many of my close friends and the majority of my class would be leaving to attend four year universities, the same universities I had applied to but was rejected from. Instead, I would have to attend the local community college without any idea of what I wanted to do as a career, as at the time, my decision to attend university was based on experiencing the college life rather than the importance of building a solid foundation for my future. My father, a respiratory therapist, recognized my problem and encouraged me to apply for the respiratory program at the community college. He advised me that if I can become a respiratory therapist, it would provide me with a foundation on which I could reevaluate the direction of my life. Unable to conceive any reasonable options of my own, I followed my dad’s recommendation and was eventually accepted into the respiratory therapy program.

 

During this time in community college, I met and interacted on a consistent basis with many older classmates who returned to school due to a myriad of reasons, primarily unemployment, job insecurities, and family matters as well as the difficulties they had to endure juggling schoolwork, jobs, and family. These exchanges made me realize that I was at a point in life where I should be capitalizing on my education to establish a solid foundation that would not crumble easily in the future. From that point on, I committed myself to finishing the respiratory therapy program and establishing myself as a health care provider, eventually obtaining my respiratory therapy license and being hired at UCLA medical center.

 

My experiences working as a respiratory therapist caring for critical and chronic patients, along with my interactions with patients and a variety of health care professionals, made me reevaluate my future goal. Working in the hospital made me understand that what I had learned up to this point was only scratching the surface of the human body and gave me a new found passion to learn more about the field of medicine. I would make time at work to follow doctors, PAs, and NPs on their rounds and listen in on how they review a patient’s history, describe the patient’s chief complaints and important events in the patient’s hospital course, and devise appropriate treatment plans. Whenever I did my patient research using physicians’ notes and patient’s history and physical in preparation for change of shift report, I would try to learn as much as I can about the diverse disorders as well as their respective treatment options instead of being fixated solely on the pulmonary ailments. Many of the physicians I worked with were residents and interns who would request information from me about patients’ pulmonary status and advice on respiratory treatments and ventilators. Likewise, I would inquire about the other complications afflicting patients and they were more often than not eager to impart their knowledge to me, which made me enthusiastic to learn more so as to become more knowledgeable and provide better care for my patients given that my current understanding of the human body was limited to a specific portion of the body.

 

On the other hand, my interactions with doctors disclosed the many negative aspects of being a doctor, more so than the positives. I noticed the stress that doctors had to endure, even the attending doctors, owing to their long hours and unpredictable schedules due to being on call. I had seen multiple doctors complain about how miserable they were and that if they were given another chance, they would have chosen another career. I was no stranger to stress myself, as I was working and adapting to a new job while attending school to obtain my bachelor’s degree. In addition, the distance I had to travel between home, school, and work, totaled sixty to one hundred miles a day while fighting traffic. I ended up having a case of shingles at the end of my first school semester while working as an RT and became ill for a period of time while struggling with my academics when I initially switched from working day shift to working night shift.   

 

When a coworker suggested physician assistant as an alternative, I promptly did my online research on the field and realized that I would not have to concede my personal life for my career. I also shadowed a physician and a physician assistant to obtain a better comparison of the two careers and found that I associated more with the conventional life of the physician assistant than the hectic life of the physician while providing similar care. Furthermore, I was amazed at how much the PA was able to accomplish for his patients by himself and how he was also able to consult with his supervising doctor if he felt uncertain on a particular problem. As a result, I dedicated myself to pursue PA school rather than medical school as the PA profession provided a better balance between personal life and a proficient career. 

 

As a RT, I understand the importance of teamwork between levels of medical professions and can relate to their roles and difficulties when providing care, but cannot assist them to the extent that a PA could due to the limited expertise and scope of practice. In addition, I will be committed to my education so as to advance my medical knowledge in order to provide quality care to patients who may otherwise be neglected by busy doctors. PAs are a valuable asset to modern healthcare and will only become more important in the imminent future, therefore I would cherish the chance to partake in and contribute to the progressive development of the PA profession.

 

 

 

Currently a bit too long (by about 700 characters). Any suggestions as to what to cut out? Thank you very much to anyone taking the time to read this and/or comment!