Physician Assistant vs. Physician Associate: A Rose is a Rose?

Juliet: "What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet."

Okay, show of hands.

Who would prefer we change the name of our profession?

Should it be Physician Assistant or Physician Associate? Or, something different altogether?

Physician Assistant

Patients are already confused by what we do. Wouldn't a name change just confuse them even more?

Part of this patient confusion comes from the term assistant. It assumes (rightfully so) that we are indeed "assisting" someone; in this case a doctor.

The term itself would lead one to believe that at some point during their office visit they should have time with the actual physician for whom the PA is assisting.

As a family practice Physician Assistant in a rural setting, I usually work alongside other PAs and Nurse Practitioners. Nowadays rarely is there a doctor to be found on site. And that is OK; there is always someone available by phone if necessary.

In other words, I rarely "assist."

But, this, in my opinion, is just semantics. I am proud of what I do as a Physician Assistant and the high quality of service I bring to my patients.

When my patients ask me when I am going to become a doctor, I just smile and explain the millions of reasons why I love my job, why I became a PA and why even if given a free "upgrade" to MD I would never even consider it.

Physician Associate

The term associate is not absent of ambiguity.

Just look at one of the definitions assigned by Wikipedia:

Associate, a person who is in league with the Mafia but is not treated as a full member, e.g. a corrupt official.

Not that there isn't a bit of a "cool" factor that comes with being likened to the mafia.

I think the big complaint about the term "assistant" is that it comes with a feeling of subservience. In a law firm, an associate is a low-level lawyer. The problem with this is that PAs are not low-level doctors they are something entirely different.

Maybe the main problem is the term Physician

A physician is at the highest level of the medical field. And therefore, the term should be reserved for just that.

For a comparison take a look at variations of the term Nurse:

Nurse
Nurse Practitioner
Certified Nurses Assistant
Licensed Vocational Nurse
Nurse Midwife
Nurse Anesthesiologist

This professional deviation from the term "nurse" is far removed from the original intention.

Here are some other common medical professions:

Emergency Medical Technician
Medical Assistant
Respiratory therapist
Psychiatrist
Psychologist
Radiologists
Scrub Tech
Surgeon
Physical Therapist
Occupational Therapist
Physician
Doctor
Dentist
Dental Hygienist
Nutritionist
Social Worker
Phlebotomist
Pathologist

Here you see many different qualifiers such as: "Therapist," "Worker," "Tech," "Technician" and once again "Assistant."

Outside of the medical field are other types of professions that exist alongside another "main" occupation; Paralegal comes to mind.

One could make the case then for the term Para-medical instead of Physician Assistant, but this is just too confusing. Especially given the closely related term paramedic.

A New Profession:

In all honesty, the physician assistant of 2018 is a lot different from the PA of 1977.

Part of what has happened is that we are coming to terms with the fact that to be an excellent diagnostician in primary care one does not need to attend medical school and complete a residency.

There is a minimum effective dose for primary care, and that is probably the education of a Physician Assistant.

Of course, while working alongside a physician in a surgical role the term assistant is always appropriate.

So maybe what we need then is an entirely new professional designation.

It is not the "Assistant" or "Associate" designation we should be concerned about but the term "Physician"!

Otherwise we will always be playing the same game, creating the same patient confusion and constantly struggling to find our own identity.

But, if you want my personal opinion the term "assistant" and "physician" are forever two star-crossed lovers... In the words of William Shakespeare:

A Rose By Any Other Name Would Smell As Sweet!

Comments

Impala says
January 20, 2019 at 7:19 am

I don’t work in the medical field and that being said my comments are based on my actual experience with PA’s. I no longer accept being evaluated by a PA. I believe a more appropriate title might be Medical Aide. Over the course of the last several years my experience with PA’s is as follows:
1) evaluated a skin lesion as a “boil” when in fact it was basal cell carcinoma
2) determined that the severe pain following back surgery was part of the healing process. Turns out it was a large hematoma pressing on the spinal cord requiring immediate emergency surgery
3) prescribed a cardiac drug without evaluating drug interactions thus missing a very severe interaction
4) determined that the severe pain from an implanted spinal stimulator was due to pain med withdrawal when in fact the pain was due to a massive infection requiring the removal of the stimulator followed by several weeks of IV antibiotics.

Now, whenever I make an appointment with a doctor I make it perfectly clear that I want nothing to do with a PA other than taking my vitals I.e. blood pressure, temperature and pulse. If that is not acceptable I simply go to someone else. I also believe that PA should have to carry their own malpractice insurance. Once it becomes public knowledge how many patients they actually kill I think we will finally start to see the PA come under more stringent control.

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- Bisley says
  January 21, 2019 at 11:26 pm
  
  I could not agree with you more. I recently had an appointment with my pcp and a physician assistant came in to go over my medical history. As I was explaining my history with chronic kidney disease she had this blank look on her face. So I asked her a few basic question specific to kidney disease such as pauci immune, The difference between PANCA and C-ANCA, creatinine clearance and GFR and she had no clue about what I was asking. Instead of admitting she had no clue she tried to BS me.
  The real problem is that they don’t know what they don’t know. I only hope that people wise up and demand to see a real doctor. Once the law suits start hitting I believe things will change.
  
  Reply
Anonymous says
January 5, 2019 at 10:18 pm

This article is basically a slap in the face to any Primary Care Physician who comes into work intending to do his or her job well. I am a resident at a top U.S. medical center that hires top ancillary staff so I am very well aware of Physician Assistant knowledge and capabilities. Your premise that you do not need to attend medical school and residency to be an excellent diagnostician exposes your arrogance. While it’s true that four years or medical school and three years of FM/IM residency is a lot, the medical model will always be the superior model and should always carry ultimate responsibility for patients. While PAs are taught basic science and can access resources to learn the zebras, they simply aren’t tested on it to the level an MD/DO is. When it comes to clinical education, emphasis is always on presentation of patients and getting consults from other providers by acting like a broken record “my attending wants it”. In the primary care setting, there is no investigation into the primary cause. Yes, diabetes and hypertension are the common causes of CKD, but if the patient is leaking protein for months with a lower GFR, you better do a further work up into the other causes. PAs routinely miss this because they of the attitude that “medicine is not complicated” and the fact that they view their job as a 9-5 with no obligation for continual education.

Before you start worrying about the term physician, why don’t you instill moral accountability into your trainees and let them leave only when the job is done instead of having them dump all their unfinished business on residents? How about you make them write notes that make sense and be interpretable by other medical providers instead of ones that look like they’re written by broken speech recognition software? How about you hold them to higher standards in terms of actually having them compete with physicians regarding medical knowledge because the PANCE is a joke? How about you instill a culture of continual self directed learning instead of training your future profession to view medicine as not that complicated that can be 9-5’ed? I know…because at the end of the day, you think deep down that physicians are stupid and your way is better, but when push comes to shove you just push buttons, don’t think, and think that physicians will clean up your mess. If you want to practice independently why don’t you learn actual medicine and instead learn to manage patients instead of presenting them? How about you take accountability for your errors? Oh wait, if you do that, you’re going to be in school longer, working from 6am-7pm with weekends when you’re out. I’m not even a primary care physician but I make it a point to have every one of my patients see an actual MD/DO when I see PA-C or CNP under the PCP designation.

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- A says
  January 20, 2019 at 1:33 am
  
  This response is extremely arrogant. No where in this article did anyone claim physicians are stupid. It is because of people like you that PAs want a name change in the first place- they don’t want to be seen as YOUR assistant. PAs work incredibly hard and DO follow the medical model in the accelerated 2-3 years of graduate school. How about instead of bashing on them for wanting respect you instead learn to respect all those in the medical profession because nothing would get done without each and every one of them. You do not walk on water sir and you most certainly don’t have the right to insult on your fellow healthcare professionals.
  
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- Bisley says
  January 21, 2019 at 11:32 pm
  
  I could not agree with you more. With regards to the PANCE test, I took a 100 question sample test and scored in the high 70’s and I have no medical background other than what I have learned managing my own health.
  
  Reply
Samuel Simmons PA-C says
April 10, 2018 at 4:15 am

The US Department of State uses the term Medical Provider (FSMP or foreign service medical provider) which is pretty much identical to “medical practitioner”. And yes it is broad and encompasses PAs and NPs. When you think about it, ALL healthcare professionals provide medical care.
I don’t think the word “physician” is the problem as long as it has a prefix/suffix to indicate we are different from MDs and DOs. Patients seem to understand doctor, doc, physician, etc. to mean “the person ultimately taking care of me”, and I find that patients will continue to call me (doctor, etc) even after correcting them and clearly explaining what a PA is. I have seen this with NPs as well. Patients will see you as the “doctor” if you are the one ultimately taking care of them, regardless of what your title is and the explanation you give them. And so the confusion arises when the “doc, or person taking care of them”, is wearing a name tag with the word “Assistant” in the title. In my opinion, Physician Associate may not be perfect, but probably best. The word “associate” may be ambiguous, but at least it is not misleading like the word “assistant”. No profession will have the perfect title; the title “doctor” is actually quit ambiguous as well. And NPs have it even worse! I think the term “Physician Associate” removes confusion and allows some room for the continuous evolution of our profession.

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- Stephen Pasquini PA-C says
  April 10, 2018 at 8:00 am
  
  The only problem is that I am going to have to rename my website 🙂 But, the general consensus seems to be in agreement with your sentiments!
  
  Stephen
  
  Reply
Luke says
October 8, 2016 at 6:56 pm

Most days I don’t have time to explain what a Physician Assistant is to my patients in a busy Urgent Care setting. Oftentimes, I will describe my profession as “similar to a Nurse Practitioner” to move the conversation forward. Physician Assistant does not do our profession justice as for most of us don’t just “assist” but practice medicine! Physician Associate, Medical Practitioner, anything but Assistant. This is a topic that needs to be addressed by our governing officials then voted on by the PA profession.

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- Stephen Pasquini PA-C says
  October 9, 2016 at 8:34 am
  
  Hi Luke,
  
  I used to disagree, and felt that a name change would just confuse our patients even more. But given how often people ask me “when are you going to go back to school and “go all the way”” I am realizing that maybe you (and the AAPA) are right and the term “assist” is a problem. Nobody asks the nurse, or the radiology tech, or the anesthetist or really anybody else with a health professional degree that questions. People do ask medical assistants that questions though, and we share a part of our name in common. The AAPA has proposed that we are just “PAs”, kind of like and RN except the acronym would have no real meaning. The other part of the problem is that we use the word “physician” and as long as that is part of our title we will always be in some way “less” or in “search” of something “more”. In the UK PAs are called physician associates, but I am not sure I am a fan of that either.
  
  Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the topic.
  
  Stephen
  
  Reply
  - Luke says
    October 10, 2016 at 7:29 pm
    
    Stephen,
    
    The AAPA proposal for just “PAs” is the most ambiguous term yet. Try to think of an acronym in English today that has no meaning behind it, exactly, they are none! I’m not saying Physician Associate is the perfect term, but it is less misleading and more representative of the education, responsibility, and skill level required to function as a PA. I think you would be surprised to see how many PAs in training/practicing want a name change and I think this needs to be at the top of AAPA discussions. AAPA needs to obtain a list then defer the issue to a nation wide vote of physician assistant constituents. In the mean time, I may discuss with the UK PAs on how they are perceived and give you feedback.
    
    Reply
    - Stephen Pasquini PA-C says
      October 14, 2016 at 12:49 pm
      
      I agree completely about the acronym PA – seems like it is being used more as a “placeholder” until there is some consensus. I think you are on the right track regarding discussing this issue with those working in the UK.. I am eager to hear your findings. Now if we could just model our healthcare in a similar universal fashion we would be making real progress.
      
      Stephen
      
      Reply
Michael Jones, BSN, RN says
January 24, 2016 at 2:00 pm

I’m an ICU RN advancing my education as either a Nurse Anesthetist or a Physician Assistant. I found this article to be extremely compelling and worth further investigation. Has the PA profession ever considered the term Medical Practioner? Nurse Practitioners, advanced practice nurses with either a Master’s or Doctorate degree study the nursing model of care, Physician Assistant’s study the medical model of career and perhaps should be called Medical Practitioners.

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- Stephen Pasquini PA-C says
  January 28, 2016 at 4:03 pm
  
  Hi Michael,
  
  I think you hit the nail on the head, if a problem does indeed exist, it isn’t with the word “assistant” it is with the word “physician”. I personally think “medical practitioner” is a bit too broad and all encompassing, but then again, I am more than happy to keep our current name mostly because it now has recognition and I believe that as practitioners we are judged far more often by our actions than by our namesake.
  
  – Stephen
  
  Reply
Paul says
December 15, 2015 at 3:22 am

The best term I have heard for the profession is “Paraphysician” as the term was originally used long ago. If you look up the definition of what is a paraprofessional, the term is more appropriate today now more than ever.

Too many are confusing Physician Assistants with Medical Assistants as a Paraphysician can have a it’s own level of ability in the public’s eye such as a paralegal in law or a paramedic. See the wikipedia listing for Physician Assistants as the industry is moving towards the title of “Paraphysicians.” For details see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physician_assistant
or http://brunerfoundation.org/BFhistory.html

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