Is PA worth it?

[FiremedicMike]

I actually prefer recorded lectures with powerpoints followed by intense study guides.. This format is what's always given me max retention..

I like to take notes during the lecture, then review them as I'm filling out the study guide, then pour over the study guide..

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[pamac]

I saw my wife do her NP training and they did have a lock down browser, but no one staring at you. There wasn't even a time limit on most of the test. What stops a NP student from having another computer open/resources/phone, etc...

Again, if done right then I am 100% fine with online education, but there has to be someone monitoring these people.

I never once took an exam in NP school that wasn't timed. They also only gave us enough time to complete the exam if you knew the answer on initial presentation. If you took more than a few moments to answer, you were already behind, and wouldn't be able to finish if you were hunting for answers elsewhere. On top of that, the majority of them presented one question at a time, with no returning once your answer was submitted. So you have a 50 question test, with 20 minutes to finish, and have to take each question one at a time, not knowing if you are looking at a harder question that you should think about, or one of the easier ones. You don't know from what chapter it would be coming from because there are 4-12 chapters in the weeks readings. There wasn't anyone looking things up unless they didn't want to finish the test and lose points that way. One course even messed with our heads by putting extra credit questions at the start of the test, so you had to decide if you wanted to risk time on that, or stick to the official questions (the answer is that you treat every question like a test question as long as the extra credit and official questions are worth the same points).

I was lucky in that I've heard of some programs that have you place a webcam in the room where they monitor you that way (I don't know if they just recorded it or monitored it live, or what).

 

[MidwestPAC]

I never once took an exam in NP school that wasn't timed. They also only gave us enough time to complete the exam if you knew the answer on initial presentation. If you took more than a few moments to answer, you were already behind, and wouldn't be able to finish if you were hunting for answers elsewhere. On top of that, the majority of them presented one question at a time, with no returning once your answer was submitted. So you have a 50 question test, with 20 minutes to finish, and have to take each question one at a time, not knowing if you are looking at a harder question that you should think about, or one of the easier ones. You don't know from what chapter it would be coming from because there are 4-12 chapters in the weeks readings. There wasn't anyone looking things up unless they didn't want to finish the test and lose points that way. One course even messed with our heads by putting extra credit questions at the start of the test, so you had to decide if you wanted to risk time on that, or stick to the official questions (the answer is that you treat every question like a test question as long as the extra credit and official questions are worth the same points).

I was lucky in that I've heard of some programs that have you place a webcam in the room where they monitor you that way (I don't know if they just recorded it or monitored it live, or what).

This is the issue with NP training. You are stating a different testing than my wife that went to a very good state FNP program and your exams were not even proctored by anything. Again, what stops someone having another person in the room helping you even if it is timed. Do you not see the issue with the differences in NP education and even your program not being monitored while testing. How can someone say that every NP out there did cheat? You cannot. Would you like your ortho surgeon cheating and the PA that works with him/her cheating? How does that make you feel? This is my feelings with most NPs and truly not knowing their education. It is not standardized, that is the issue.

 

[psychnurse]

Online delivery can be superb, if the school invests a lot of money and resources into the platform. Unfortunately, that's not the case for majority of the online NP programs (think Walden and Regis). Most of these programs throw students a list of readings, refer them to Youtube videos, and grade students based on online discussions and papers. Some of these programs don't even have lecture videos recorded by the faculty, which to me is absolutely insane. What are you paying tuition for exactly?

 

[MidwestPAC]

Online delivery can be superb, if the school invests a lot of money and resources into the platform. Unfortunately, that's not the case for majority of the online NP programs (think Walden and Regis). Most of these programs throw students a list of readings, refer them to Youtube videos, and grade students based on online discussions and papers. Some of these programs don't even have lecture videos recorded by the faculty, which to me is absolutely insane. What are you paying tuition for exactly?

My wife went to a state school and it was not much better than a relative that is going to Walden for Psych NP. I would guess only the brick and mortar schools are the only ones I would truly feel a little comfortable with knowing they are at least being watched while testing. I won't speak about the very low clinical hours or the fluffy school work...

 

[psychnurse]

My wife went to a state school and it was not much better than a relative that is going to Walden for Psych NP.

That's true. The so-called "Flagship" state university in my state offers DNP programs that do not secure preceptors and is completely online. It drives me crazy.

I still wouldn't compare it to Walden...that accepts anyone with a pulse and a wallet. It worries me that they're graduating Psych NPs.

 

[pamac]

Everything about your wife’s education screams to me that it sucked. Don’t know what to tell her.

Every year it seems there is a cheating scandal in medical schools all over the place, so I think it’s amusing to suggest that it’s the nature of Np schools to be rampant with it just because it’s possible. I’m also trying to square that with how easy everyone who hasn’t been there says it is. So not only is it easy, but it’s so easy that the NPs cheat. It’s almost as if everyone insisting that thinks that NP students don’t know that there will be a day of reckoning for ignoring material that they will be required to have to take care of patients.

 

[pamac]

That's true. The so-called "Flagship" state university in my state offers DNP programs that do not secure preceptors and is completely online. It drives me crazy.

I still wouldn't compare it to Walden...that accepts anyone with a pulse and a wallet. It worries me that they're graduating Psych NPs.

The poor performers don’t end up getting jobs or keeping them. Nobody hires Walden psyche NPs. I have friends that have done Walden against my advice, and go figure they are having a hard time finding work.

 

[MidwestPAC]

Everything about your wife’s education screams to me that it sucked. Don’t know what to tell her.

Every year it seems there is a cheating scandal in medical schools all over the place, so I think it’s amusing to suggest that it’s the nature of Np schools to be rampant with it just because it’s possible. I’m also trying to square that with how easy everyone who hasn’t been there says it is. So not only is it easy, but it’s so easy that the NPs cheat. It’s almost as if everyone insisting that thinks that NP students don’t know that there will be a day of reckoning for ignoring material that they will be required to have to take care of patients.

Please quote me that I said NPs were rampant at cheating, I said that if the opportunity is there more people will cheat than if the opportunity is not there. That is true for any online education that there is no proctoring. That is human nature with high stakes test and your career. Please quit twisting words, the truth is the truth. Just accept it.

 

[MidwestPAC]

The poor performers don’t end up getting jobs or keeping them. Nobody hires Walden psyche NPs. I have friends that have done Walden against my advice, and go figure they are having a hard time finding work.

I worked at an UC with a Walden FNP grad and he was awful. I have personally known several NPs my wife has worked with that went to Walden and they have jobs...Maybe it is just your area, but they are around. The Walden grad never heard of basic things such as subungual hematoma and mattress sutures....that is just the very start....crazy. I left that job (it was my PRN job) cause he was always asking me questions and he has been out 3 years...

 

[pamac]

Please quote me that I said NPs were rampant at cheating, I said that if the opportunity is there more people will cheat than if the opportunity is not there. That is true for any online education that there is no proctoring. That is human nature with high stakes test and your career. Please quit twisting words, the truth is the truth. Just accept it.

If you aren’t suggesting that, then that’s good. We are seeing some improvement on that score.

I explained what my program did to discouraged cheating, and I felt like it was pretty effective. At least for me, it took away any temptation to even have a book there to refer to. You just had to know the material.

 

[Ho0v-man]

If you aren’t suggesting that, then that’s good. We are seeing some improvement on that score.

I explained what my program did to discouraged cheating, and I felt like it was pretty effective. At least for me, it took away any temptation to even have a book there to refer to. You just had to know the material.

One could still have a knowledgeable NP/NP student such as yourself literally stand in the room and tell you the answers. Or just have someone else take the whole thing for them. There’s also the possibility of someone screenshotting (is this a word? Lol) the questions so someone else can look them up later and distribute them to the entire class or even put them on quizlet. Kudos to you for not scamming your way through, but without a formal proctor in place and an easy option like what I described above available, the majority of students will cheat in any degree program. Proctor U is literally like $25/test (2013 data here) so there’s no excuse for unproctored exams.

Even though I don’t condone cheating, I could see why someone in an NP program would consider it. The vast majority of the curriculum seems unimportant to pt care.

 

[pamac]

One could still have a knowledgeable NP/NP student such as yourself literally stand in the room and tell you the answers. Or just have someone else take the whole thing for them. There’s also the possibility of someone screenshotting (is this a word? Lol) the questions so someone else can look them up later and distribute them to the entire class or even put them on quizlet. Kudos to you for not scamming your way through, but without a formal proctor in place and an easy option like what I described above available, the majority of students will cheat in any degree program. Proctor U is literally like $25/test (2013 data here) so there’s no excuse for unproctored exams.

Even though I don’t condone cheating, I could see why someone in an NP program would consider it. The vast majority of the curriculum seems unimportant to pt care.

Like I say, cheating exists everywhere. Most of what I saw in undergrad for pre med folks who I heard were cheating were people who obtained an old test, or wrote down the material for someone else to study after they took the test.

I definitely studied harder in courses for my biology degree or original RN degree than I ever did for NP school. And I never saw folks cheating in NP school. Most of my cohort was uptight about things and over-thought things. Nobody would confab with each other for fear of having an electronic paper trail detailing them talking about a test. At least that’s how I thought things were. But to have someone come over to take a test for me, or to set up a group of folks to feed me answers not only would make me look like a fool to people that I respect, but it would be also hard to set up. My spouse isn’t a PA, and even if they were, you wouldn’t get a lot of pertinent knowledge in context from them in a situation like that. I’d literally only have like 20 seconds per question to devote to the process, so getting a PA buddy to come over and feed me answers (while also losing his respect) would be less feasible than just studying like I should and settling for an 80% if I had to. You’d be surprised how much you learn when they don’t make you feel like you are going to fail all the time.

The majority of material is dedicated to patient care. I don’t know why you would have the impression that it is otherwise. The stuff that isn’t focused directly on it isn’t the hard stuff anyway, so why would someone cheat on easy stuff either?

So the cheating suggestion seems like it’s based on some fantasy elements that look good on paper but not in practice.

 

[Splenda88]

That's true. The so-called "Flagship" state university in my state offers DNP programs that do not secure preceptors and is completely online. It drives me crazy.

I still wouldn't compare it to Walden...that accepts anyone with a pulse and a wallet. It worries me that they're graduating Psych NPs.

It does not matter. Studies have shown that NP outcomes are equal or even better than physicians'

 

[Ho0v-man]

[QUOTE="pamac, post: 21089034, member: 321911]

You’d be surprised how much you learn when they don’t make you feel like you are going to fail all the time.

[/QUOTE]

Not sure what the point of this statement is. I’m interpreting it as meaning an easy curriculum somehow lets you learn more which is a nonsense statement so clearly I’ve missed something.

I’ve seen people cheat in NP school. Maybe you haven’t but I have. Granted, they were more relaxed curricula than yours apparently, but I’ve outlined how easy it would be already even in that situation. Pretend it’s fantasy if it protects your ego. But I know it’s reality. It’s frankly illogical to acknowledge cheating happening in premed/medschool but call it fantasy in NP school despite NP school having less oversight in testing situations almost universally.

 

[pamac]

[QUOTE="pamac, post: 21089034, member: 321911]

You’d be surprised how much you learn when they don’t make you feel like you are going to fail all the time.

Not sure what the point of this statement is. I’m interpreting it as meaning an easy curriculum somehow lets you learn more which is a nonsense statement so clearly I’ve missed something.

I’ve seen people cheat in NP school. Maybe you haven’t but I have. Granted, they were more relaxed curricula than yours apparently, but I’ve outlined how easy it would be already even in that situation. Pretend it’s fantasy if it protects your ego. But I know it’s reality. It’s frankly illogical to acknowledge cheating happening in premed/medschool but call it fantasy in NP school despite NP school having less oversight in testing situations almost universally.
[/QUOTE]

Well.... you know that the person that you helped to cheat cheated, so I’ll give you that one.

I’m not saying that Np cheating is fantasy, just highlighting how folks tend to pick the things that concern them. You’ve picked this supposed NP cheating that you say is going on because you can envision it happening....so therefore, I’m your big brain, it must be happening (even though I demonstrated how it’s probably not a huge issue).

And finally, I was relaxed in NP school because I knew that if I studied hard enough to know the answer to a question the moment I saw it, I wouldn’t need to worry about looking up answers or getting someone like Hoov-man to come over to my house and pretend he knows how to take a nurse practitioner test that I could have passed if I had only just studied by myself.

 

[pamac]

I guess another point I always wondered was how useful you would have been as an undergrad cheating for an NP student on a nursing test. Is a biology undergrad in possession of such prime knowledge that you automatically know everything about nursing practice and treatment approaches before you even were in a position to know best practices off the top of your head? I just know that as a biology undergrad, I couldn’t have picked up an NP test and have done very well, unless I had read the pertinent chapter. I have a biology degree and a significant amount of biology coursework, and it wouldn’t have worked that way in any test I’ve ever taken in NP school.

 

[Ho0v-man]

Perhaps your coursework had some modicum of rigor, but from what I’ve seen and as I said before, anyone with an internet connection could have passed those tests.

 

[Ho0v-man]

Wow. I just realized that this is the ridiculous thread I gave up on. It’s so far off base I thought it was another one. I thought I clicked “unwatch”

 

[pamac]

Wow. I just realized that this is the ridiculous thread I gave up on. It’s so far off base I thought it was another one. I thought I clicked “unwatch”

Why would you feel like we needed to know that you thought you “unwatched” this thread? Seems weird to care about that.

 

[Tman507]

EM doctor here and worked with many PA/NP in the ER. I have a high achieving college student wanting my thoughts on PA school and I have always advised that this is a fantastic option but looking at the landscape, I don't feel this way anymore.

We started to use only PAs in the ER about 10 yrs ago and it was difficulty to find PAs who wanted to work in the ER for $60/hr with benefits which is about 125K/yr with benefits. This is a big city and everyone wants to live here so highly competitive.

Over the past 10 yrs, There seems to be a glutton of NPs graduating and has flooded the market with midlevels. So ERs where I work at have more NPs than PAs with a corresponding decrease in pay. Even in nondesireable places there are no shortage of APCs wanting to work in the ER.

It seems like every young ER nurse is working while doing online NP degrees which essentially are degree mill.

Now our ERs have a dominance of NPs just b/c the group has a working relationship with these nurses and they already know the system. Its a no brainer hiring within.


This trend will continue to Push PAs out of the ER and I suspect most other settings as both fields are interchangeable in the mind of physicians.

Hey, medstudent here
There are PAs in Cali making well over 300k+ and NPs making 500k+
I was really shocked when I saw this

I think most of them are in correctional facilities, Money is in Prison medicine.
You can do PA then a Prison fellowship if there is one, should be an easier/shorter route.

Quite a few of the nurses I see getting that much are CRNAs, but not all of them tho(you can check the links) . NPs are more likely to hold a management position as well.

You'd just work along with NPs in a health setting, they do have a strong presence in medicine and they do vital work for a hospitals functioning but that doesn't mean that a PA is any lesser. A Doctor, NP and PA are all separate professions and hospitals use each of them for different reasons and there will always be openings for each of them, the latter along with many other health professions form part of a health system.
PAs will probably always find work and
in this case could be a sweet deal.
With every job you just need to be honest with your work and play your cards correctly.

I hope you make a decision that will lead to good!

Link with salaries, name of NP/PA benefits etc are there

PA link

'Physician assistant ' search results | Transparent California

Search California public, government employee, workers salaries, pensions and compensation

transparentcalifornia.com

Nurse link

'Nurse' search results | Transparent California

Search California public, government employee, workers salaries, pensions and compensation

transparentcalifornia.com

Edit: i did not read the OP message under the question

 

[Tman507]

I just started to read over this thread a bit and didn't realise i posted in an unhealthy thread... I just want to say that I appreciate NPs and PAs for the work they do. But with all due respect you have to realise that Nurses, Doctors and PAs are all different qualifications, with different training and different extent to which they can practice medicine.
Some NPs can't handle PAs doing some of their work and Doctors can't stand the fact that NPs want to put themselves on the level of a MD. If you want to do that then you're better off going to medschool.
I personally have friends that are NPs that are now studying medicine with me. They were cum laude students in nursing, and are struggling and repeating modules in medical school. I've had my fair amount of challenges too, but we help each other out where we can, medschool is tough and everyone knows it.

The clinical reasoning that a Doctor uses in every decision he makes is something that is not appreciated by many.
NPs also have a different approach to a problem and that too we must appreciate.
*One of the most important concepts in medicine is that every practitioner has to know their limitations (in knowledge, clinical medicine, diagnosis, treatment etc) ... If you miss that referral or if you're uncomfortable with a procedure etc. its a persons life at stake.

If a PCP (MD/NP/PA) does a course on stroke it doesn't mean that he/she trumps or is at the same level as the neurologist at diagnosing stroke. Your understanding, identification and protocols will probably be heightened, but thats where the boat stops, because that's all that is clinically relevant to you.

*NPs want to earn as much as a MD, its natural to want to earn a better living but the problem is that if an NP is paid the same as a MD, who is most likely to be employed by the hospital?

 

[pamac]

*NPs want to earn as much as a MD, its natural to want to earn a better living but the problem is that if an NP is paid the same as a MD, who is most likely to be employed by the hospital?

I have no problem with physicians making more money than me, and I’d be hard pressed to find a physician that doesn’t make more than me. They deserve great pay, and I’d like to see them have less burden. What I’m less enamored with is either not getting paid according to the value of the work I produce (which can be considerable), or else sacrificing extra wealth to enrich someone who is not working as hard as I am. Most of the time, that’s not the physician, but is instead an administrator or some other entity that would love to pad the bottom line.

Boosting an NP or PAs salary from $100,000 to $140,000 is reasonable based on the revenue they generate. But you see clinics and facilities balk at that because it cuts into their bottom line. But they used to employ MDs for much more than that. They are using all sorts of excuses to justify keeping the financial windfall of having non physician providers on staff.

 

[Tman507]

I have no problem with physicians making more money than me, and I’d be hard pressed to find a physician that doesn’t make more than me. They deserve great pay, and I’d like to see them have less burden. What I’m less enamored with is either not getting paid according to the value of the work I produce (which can be considerable), or else sacrificing extra wealth to enrich someone who is not working as hard as I am. Most of the time, that’s not the physician, but is instead an administrator or some other entity that would love to pad the bottom line.

Boosting an NP or PAs salary from $100,000 to $140,000 is reasonable based on the revenue they generate. But you see clinics and facilities balk at that because it cuts into their bottom line. But they used to employ MDs for much more than that. They are using all sorts of excuses to justify keeping the financial windfall of having non physician providers on staff.

Its actually simple business, the higher you climb up the corporate ladder the less labor you do, your work turns into management, delegation and decision making...its like that with all jobs outside the medical field. NPs can take up management positions as well, and some places prefer this because of lower pay, however I've seen on the link in my previous messages that one NP is paid 700k

Note, A MD naturally takes an authoritative stance in the clinical setting, its what medstudents are trained to do. Health providers holding and MD certification are the highest form of health provider in each field of clinical medicine.

However being an NP or in any profession can be very profitable if you play your cards right. How much you run around and tirelessly want to help everyone is up to you, i know doctors and nurses that do this. The main thing is to focus on your patients only, do your work honestly and go home. Find a side gig to make extra bucks, thats about it. People think its all about the profession, not necessarily... Its about volume of work/patients/procedures.

Unfortunately getting a mild pay boost is totally out of our hands, you just have to work smart.