What are Physician Associates?
Physician associates are healthcare professionals who work as part of a multidisciplinary team with supervision from a named senior doctor (a General Medical Council registered consultant or general practitioner), providing care to patients in primary, secondary and community care environments. PAs are part of the government’s medical associate professions (MAPs) grouping in the health and care workforce and have been working in the UK since 2003.
Physician associates (PAs) are healthcare professionals who work under the supervision of a doctor within multi-disciplinary teams. They are not doctors.
PAs usually start out as health professionals or university graduates with biomedical science or life science degrees. They then complete two years of further education and training to gain a PA qualification. Before they start work, PAs are also expected to pass an exam called the PA National Exam, which is currently run by the Royal College of Physicians.
PAs can’t prescribe or request ionising radiation like x-rays or CT scans.
Although the PA profession has existed in the UK for around 20 years, you might never have been treated by a PA because of the relatively small size of the profession. The Faculty of Physician Associates maintains a voluntary register of PAs.
What do physician associates do?
Physician associates work within a defined scope of practice and limits of competence. They:
- take medical histories from patients
- carry out physical examinations
- see patients with undifferentiated diagnoses
- see patients with long-term chronic conditions
- formulate differential diagnoses and management plans
- perform diagnostic and therapeutic procedures
- develop and deliver appropriate treatment and management plans
- request and interpret diagnostic studies
- provide health promotion and disease prevention advice for patients.
Currently, physician associates are not able to:
- prescribe
- request ionising radiation (eg chest x-ray or CT scan).
I’m seeing a Physician Associate in Afon Elai – what can I expect?
The Physician Associate will ask you for information about your presentation, perform any relevant examinations that may be indicated, and from there determine an appropriate management plan.
It may be that a Physician Associate needs to discuss your case with a senior GP on the day. We always have GPs at both sites who our Physician Associates are free to liase with every day, throughout the day.
If a prescription or ionising radiation is felt to be indicated then this will be discussed with a GP and actioned promptly. You may have to wait for around 10 minutes after your appointment or return a little later while this is discussed and actioned for you.
A Physician Associate appointment in Afon Elai is usually 20 minutes.
Having more clinicians in our team creates more appointment availability and we hope this improves continuity of care.
We triage all patients on the day. Having medical associate professionals (MAPs) within our team means that we are able to see more people sooner.
Our Physician Associates are not doctors, and they are happy to be addressed by their first names. You can shorten Physician Associate to “PA” for ease.
