dhmiles Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 Hello, I am currently wrapping up my clinical year of PA school and have two electives to complete before I finish. I am dead set on practicing emergency medicine and am trying to decide which electives will be most beneficial before I attempt to start my career in this field. I have already completed two 6 wk EM rotations and could always do another. I was also considering ortho, cardiology, derm, trauma. As practicing EMPAs, what do you recommend? Any advice is greatly appreciated. Thanks! Dustin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rcdavis Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 Ortho and cards. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Medic207 Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 Ortho and cards. Agree totally! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator ventana Posted February 14, 2013 Moderator Share Posted February 14, 2013 critical care, RCU, ICU dx radiology as a hit - get that plain film and CT knowledge down Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
primadonna22274 Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 Definitely ortho. A toss-up between cards and critical care for 2nd. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jen0508 Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 I agree ortho was a helpful rotation. However make sure you rotate somewhere where you are in the office more than in the OR. I rotated at a sports medicine practice and have found the experience very helpful as an EM PA. if you didnt have a peds rotation (or a good one) i would recommend peds. you will see lots and lots of sick kids. my peds rotation wasnt a strong one so i had initial trouble dealing with the kiddos, and dosing their meds Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator EMEDPA Posted February 14, 2013 Moderator Share Posted February 14, 2013 peds em, trauma, icu. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RetNavyPAC Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 Ortho & Peds I think would be the best bang for your buck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dhmiles Posted February 14, 2013 Author Share Posted February 14, 2013 Good stuff! Thanks everyone, greatly appreciated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
treejay Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 i'm in the same situation as the OP. My school only had us do 4 weeks of EM. I was thinking of doing an Ortho, and another 4 weeks of EM. or should I scrap the second 4 weeks in EM and shoot for critical care/icu ? i'd really like to have an experience in the icu. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator EMEDPA Posted February 14, 2013 Moderator Share Posted February 14, 2013 I did ortho and didn't find it that helpful. all the cool ortho stuff happens in the er, not the ortho clinic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kenyabill Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 I did ortho and didn't find it that helpful. all the cool ortho stuff happens in the er, not the ortho clinic. I'm set on emergency med too. My school offers a surgery rotation that we can choose. Either gen surg, ortho, neuro, or cardiothoracic. What might you guys recommend? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kargiver Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 Ortho and cards. Agreed... However, if you are strong in Cards already, I would do Ortho and Neuro. G Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
medic25 Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 I did ortho and didn't find it that helpful. all the cool ortho stuff happens in the er, not the ortho clinic. It must depend on the rotation; I learned a lot on my ortho rotation, both on ED consults and in clinic. We did a lot of splinting/casting in the clinics, and it was a good place to learn a quality shoulder/knee/spine exam. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
primadonna22274 Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 I didn't do an ortho rotation and subsequently learned most of my acute ortho in the ED ;) Plenty of chronic ortho in FM/IM.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator EMEDPA Posted February 14, 2013 Moderator Share Posted February 14, 2013 It must depend on the rotation; I learned a lot on my ortho rotation, both on ED consults and in clinic. We did a lot of splinting/casting in the clinics, and it was a good place to learn a quality shoulder/knee/spine exam. My ortho rotation was all clinic, no o.r. or er coverage. mostly chronic back pain and pre-op knee exams. all my reductions, tendon lac repairs, etc were on my er rotations(3) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
medic25 Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 My ortho rotation was all clinic, no o.r. or er coverage. mostly chronic back pain and pre-op knee exams. all my reductions, tendon lac repairs, etc were on my er rotations(3) Bummer; that would be pretty low-yield for the ED. I did my ortho rotation at a county hospital/level 1 trauma center. We did a bunch of OR cases, lots of good ED cases on consults, floor management and off-service consults, along with clinic follow-ups which involved replacing the splints and casts on a lot of the patients. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoClinic4Me Posted February 14, 2013 Share Posted February 14, 2013 Ortho and cards. Yep. That's what I did. Pat Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator EMEDPA Posted February 14, 2013 Moderator Share Posted February 14, 2013 Bummer; that would be pretty low-yield for the ED. I did my ortho rotation at a county hospital/level 1 trauma center. We did a bunch of OR cases, lots of good ED cases on consults, floor management and off-service consults, along with clinic follow-ups which involved replacing the splints and casts on a lot of the patients. I was an er tech for 5 yrs before becoming a medic so already had the splinting down. didn't do a single splint on ortho. mostly just listened to folks whine about chronic pain. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dhmiles Posted February 22, 2013 Author Share Posted February 22, 2013 Thanks again for the input. I have access to a great peds em rotation so I think I am going to utilize that. Now I have to decide between ortho or cards.... What type of cards rotation would you recommend? Clinic, hospital, surg..... just trying to increase my skill set. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator EMEDPA Posted February 22, 2013 Moderator Share Posted February 22, 2013 Thanks again for the input. I have access to a great peds em rotation so I think I am going to utilize that. Now I have to decide between ortho or cards.... What type of cards rotation would you recommend? Clinic, hospital, surg..... just trying to increase my skill set. hospital based cards maybe with some interventional if you can find it. clinic will be more like a primary care rotation so best to go for the high yield hospital stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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