Physician assistants are health care professionals licensed to practice medicine with physician supervision. As part of their comprehensive responsibilities, PAs conduct physical exams, diagnose and treat illnesses, order and interpret tests, counsel on preventive health care, assist in surgery, and write prescriptions. The PA’s responsibilities depend on the type of practice, his or her experience, the working relationship with physicians and other health care providers, and state laws.
Application to PA school is highly competitive. To be accepted into an accredited PA program, students need to
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take a variety of prerequisite courses (see below), which can vary from program to program,
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earn a competitive overall GPA, which also varies from school to school but is usually greater than a 3.2,
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have a record of clinical experiences that expose students to the practice of medicine, often with hands-on patient care (see below),
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take the GRE (some schools will accept the MCAT)
There is a fair amount of variability among PA programs in their course requirements, number of clinical hours required, types of clinical work required, and the minimum required GPA. Therefore, the very first thing interested students should do is look into the requirements of the specific PA programs in which they are interested.
Required Courses
The UMW Pre-PA Program requires its students to take the courses listed below. This list of courses is driven by the prerequisite courses of most PA programs. But as mentioned above, there is a fair amount of variability among PA programs in their course requirements, therefore the very first thing interested students should do is look into the requirements of the specific PA programs in which they are interested.
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Biology 121 (Biol Concepts) and Biol 132 (Organism Function and Diversity) – or – Biology 125 & 126 (Phage Hunters I, II).
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Chemistry 111 & 112 (General Chemistry I, II).
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Chem 211 (Organic Chem I). Requirement for Chem 212 (Organic Chem II) is highly variable.
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Introductory Statistics. STAT 180, BIOL 260 and PSYC 261 fulfill this statistics requirement.
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PSYC 100 (General Psychology)
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Human Anatomy (BIOL 384)
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Human Physiology (BIOL 413)
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Microbiology (Biol 371)
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Genetics (Biol 341)
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Medical Terminology (HSCI 120)
Other Requirements
Many PA programs also require prior healthcare experience with hands-on patient care. You can get healthcare experience by being a (not an exhaustive list):
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Medical assistant
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Emergency medical technician (EMT)
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Paramedic
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Medic or medical corpsman
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Peace Corps volunteer
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Lab assistant/phlebotomist
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Registered nurse
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Emergency room technician
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Certified nursing assistant (CNA)