place123 Posted May 29, 2015 Share Posted May 29, 2015 For the passed few months I have been investigating PA as a possible career path for many reasons. I am currently in a Didactic Program in Dietetics to become a registered dietitian but as I have become more familiar with the profession and its limitations I have began investigating other paths. I still enjoy this education and I would have still chose this major but I may or may not end choosing to be an R.D as my final career path. I already volunteer in a hospital in the dietetics department and yesterday I was allowed to meet the ER P.A and volunteer in the ER for a bit. I have read up on this forum, other online sources, read job statistics (bls.gov), and been to an advisor at my school but I would like to know more. I am most interested in primary care or "preventative health care". Dermatology is also a specialty I am interested in but for other reasons. Two things I would really like to know about a primary care P.A is what the day to day duties are and how one gets into primary care. Also, if primary care is my final job objective, would gaining work experience in a primary care setting be better than an emergency room setting? I was planning on becoming an EMT but it may be the wrong choice if I should be working in a primary care facility. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
winterallsummer Posted May 30, 2015 Share Posted May 30, 2015 EMT is fine. FM deals with many problems EM deals with (often with less testing and better treatment). My advice is find a free clinic to volunteer at and find a PA or doctor to shadow at one of the clinics associated with your hospital. We had a couple dietitians in my class. Shadowing a family med doc will show you what being a (seasoned) family med PA does. Family med is one field where is PAs have a lot of autonomy and the line between doc and PA becomes quite thin in time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
place123 Posted May 30, 2015 Author Share Posted May 30, 2015 EMT is fine. FM deals with many problems EM deals with (often with less testing and better treatment). My advice is find a free clinic to volunteer at and find a PA or doctor to shadow at one of the clinics associated with your hospital. We had a couple dietitians in my class. Shadowing a family med doc will show you what being a (seasoned) family med PA does. Family med is one field where is PAs have a lot of autonomy and the line between doc and PA becomes quite thin in time. Do you know any more information about those dietitians in your class? I hear all over these forums of how people had dietitians in their class but the only school i know of that specifically lists dietitian work as qualifying HCE is UC Davis. do you mind telling me what school you went to? I was actually going to go the local urgent care clinic to talk to them about shadowing experiences. I just thought that could possibly be too informal to just show up and ask that. Last time I asked my volunteer director she said they dont have any physician shadowing positions available right now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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