Nurse Practitioner vs Physician Assistant
Are looking to advance your nursing career path but are wondering which path to take- nurse practitioner or physician assistant?
Well, in this post we are going to do a comparison of the two job descriptions and the educational requirements for achieving both. Let’s take a look shall we?
The thing about being a Nurse Practitioner or a Physician Assistant is that at first glance they seem very similar and thus it can be difficult to make choice for your nursing career. But as we look closer at the two, we see some significant differences that should be considered when making your choice to be either a Nurse Practitioner or a Physician Assistant.
Let’s start talking about how similar these two career paths are.
As a Nurse Practitioner, or a Physician Assistant, you will have the availability to work closely with and care for your patients. You will prepare medical histories, examine the patients and develop care plans for them.
As a Nurse Practitioner, or a Physician Assistant you will be able to diagnose and treat your patients, however this is where the differences start to show. A Nurse Practitioner can do this unsupervised, where as a Physician Assistant needs to have a doctor to oversee their efforts. Now, the level of supervision varies from doctor to doctor and their comfort with the PAs experience, level of education, and skills in their particular specialty.
Both Can Prescribe Medication For Their Patients
However, here again the Physician Assistant usually is supervised by a doctor where an NP does not require the supervision.
Also, there are some medicines that a PA can not prescribe such as narcotics and because they are licensed by the state, there may be other medications that the particular states restricts.
Education Can Vary Slightly
To be a Nursing Practitioner you need to be a registered nurse and obtain a Master’s degree. Some states require a MS in Nursing, but in others it just has to be a Master’s and preferably related to the healthcare field. You will also need to take care to get additional clinical experience.
A Physician Assistant also need to get an advanced degree, along with a qualified background experience in nursing, paramedic training or equivalent emergency medical services. The PA will go for a Masters of Science in Physician Assistance and then apply for a PA license. You must pass the Physician Assistant National Certifying Examination (PANCE) in order to achieve your license.
What about Salary?
Again these to career paths are similar. All of the statistics that I have seen state that the average pay for both a Nurse Practitioner and a Physician Assistant are around $70,000-85,000 a year with an average work week of about 35 hours. With this kind of pay and hours it makes sense why there are so many nurses that are pursuing advanced education!
So, to sum it up: the tasks and daily efforts of the Nurse Practitioner and the Physician Assistant are very similar. The biggest difference I see is the autonomy that the NP gets vs. the PA. The Nurse Practitioner may have their own clinic or practice (in some states) and the Physician Assistant requires the supervision of a doctor (hence the PA title).
What differences impact in the Nurse Practitioner vs. Physician Assistant choice?
Filed under: Nursing Careers
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Wow. How far back do we have to go to correct all the missinformation in this article. PA’s are significantly better trained than NP’s, whom complete there degrees online while they work fulltime. PA’s complete extensive education in medicine, not nursing, and as a result work with physicians with a scope of practice of a physician, less surgery. A PA is the closest in training to a physician. An NP trains not in medicine, but nursing and is limited in the scope of practice in the types of patients they can see, thus the independent practice. PA’s can prescribe any medicine their supervising physician can, which includes narcotics. This article is truly misleading and defaming to the PA profession. NP’s have approximately 1/2 the education of a PA. PA’s train in every system of the body and have extensive educational modules in surgery, emergency medicine, pediatrics, and other specialties, that nurse practitioners don’t have the opportunity to learn. PA’s also must train in every system of the body clinically, but a nurse simple sellects and area to focus on such as adult medicine, pediatrics, family medicine ect.. and only trains in that specialty. Medicine understands that a broad based education is important for high quality medical care delivery.
I researched both programs carefully before deciding on the NP program. There are similarities and differences; depending on your state, you may practice independently as a NP but not as a PA; different states have different requirements for prescribing medications, but generally NPs have greater autonomy and independence. Admission requirements for Nurse Practitioners are higher: you must have an RN license, a BSN, and typically at least two years clinical experience with direct patient care for admission to an NP program; on the other hand, PAs may be admitted with just an undergraduate degree (I know a student who graduated from music school in May and began PA school in the fall! Not someone I’d want administering my medical care after a short two year training!)And, this is the real difference: an NP has two years of nursing school, usually two or more years of bedside experience, and two additional years of NP training (education that is very similar to PA school). On the other hand, PAs can have a bachelors of arts degree and only the two years of PA school. So, you compare: an NP with 8 years training, or a PA with 2 years. Who is more qualified to provide medical care? Depending on what survey you read, NPs and PAs salaries are similiar–some say PAs make more, others say NPs make more; much of this depends on the specialty chosen rather than the program attended. Also, a greater percentage of women are NPs and a greater percentage of PAs are men. Salarys of men are generally higher because of time off for child rearing, etc. Nurse Practitioners can practice independently in many states while PAs cannont–not because of a nursing lobby, but because Nurse Pratitioners have far greater experience and education than their lessor trained Physician Assistant counterparts.