Last Updated on October 21, 2021 by admin
How To Become A Physician Assistant In Oklahoma
Before moving on to describing the career path one needs to take in order to become a physician assistant in Oklahoma, it is important to say that there has been recorded a significant increase in the demand for these professionals over the past few years – there is currently a 38% demand for physician assistants in Oklahoma. Having said that, the first thing every future physician assistant needs to do in order to qualify for a training program here is to meet the admission requirements that apply to physician assistant training programs that are approved by the ARC-PA, or the Accreditation Review Commission on the Education of PAs. That being said, if the applicant is able to meet all these eligibility requirements, he or she will be admitted to a Bachelor’s or an Associate’s degree training program where the PA-S will get all the basic insight into the job.
These programs usually last for three to your years, and after that most of the physician assistants these days choose to enroll in a Master’s degree training program that will take two more years to complete. The basic course topics for the Master’s degree program usually includes physiology, patient assessment, diagnostics, anatomy and other similar courses combined with practical, hands-on experience in a clinical setting. Only after graduating from the bachelor’s and the master’s degree training programs, these students can move on to applying for a CAQ or a specialization qualification that basically allows them to pursue a more lucrative career in one of the many different subspecialties in the medical industry, ranging from urology and pediatrics to surgery, internal medicine as well as emergency care. In order for physician assistants to become specialists in any of the fields mentioned above, it is important for these health care providers to firstly become certified and then licensed.
Physician Assistant In Oklahoma – Job Description
Physician assistants are very appreciated in both the rural and the urban areas, not just in Oklahoma but in all the 50 states of the United States of America. As you may have figured out already, physician assistants have to develop collaborative professional relationships with licensed physicians that will carefully and thoroughly oversee their medical activity. That being said, there are several different factors that influence the job duties and responsibilities of a physician assistant in the state of Oklahoma, such as the amount of formal training and practical experience of the professional, the laws and regulations that govern this particular profession, as well as the health care setting where the PA works and the regulations imposed by the employer.
That being said, it often happens that physician assistants manage short-term patient issues, they can implement the directives of the physician, they can assess the overall health of the patient, they can perform physical examinations, obtain and update their medical histories, perform immunizations and vaccines, order laboratory tests and interpret the results, looking for any abnormalities, they document the medical care services the patient has been subjected to, suture and manage wounds and infections, instruct and counsel the medical patients by prescribing different therapeutic regimens, they give regular growth and development information and so forth.
Physician Assistant In Oklahoma Certification
The most important thing every physician assistants needs to do right after graduating from an ARC-PA approved physician assistant training program is to pursue certification followed by the licensure provided by the state’s Board of Medical Examiners. The only way for these health care professionals to obtain the necessary certification is by passing the PANCE examination which is administered by the National Commission on the Certification of Physician Assistants, and which is a computerized multiple choice examination that will earn the physician the PA-C designation. These professionals then need to maintain their credential active by earning no less than 100 approved CME credits every 24 months, and by passing the recertification examination every six years.
Salary and Career Info
The interactive chart above is a visual representation of the annual salary of Oklahoma PA’s compared to the national annual salaries, all based on the latest May 2022 Occupational Employment Statistics figures released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Physician Assistant Schools In Oklahoma
At the time being, there is only one notable and accredited physician assistant school in Oklahoma, and that is the University of Oklahoma located in Oklahoma City, which offers a Master’s Degree-level training program for physician assistants, in addition to the entry-level Physician Assistant Associate’s Degree training program. In addition to requiring a GRE, this accredited institution also require non native English speakers to pass the well known TOEFL examination with a good score.
List of All Accredited PA Programs
The accrediting agency is ARC-PA and they have 1 fully accredited AL programs listed as of November 2014.
1. University of Oklahoma, Tulsa
Initial Accreditation Date: September 7, 2007
Next ARC-PA Review: March 2021
Website: http://www.ou.edu/content/tulsa/pa.html
