Physician Assistants save lives by paying attention to details

22 April 2012 No Comment

Physician assistants are employees who assist the physician in any way that the doctor or physician needs. The duties of a physician assistant can vary depending on the location of work and type of work, but no matter where a physician assistant works, he or she must pay attention to details. By paying attention to details a physician assistant can prevent mistakes made within the office. Also by paying close attention to the patients, a physician assistant can observe illnesses, reactions, or any signs or warnings of a disease or allergic reaction. In a PA career having the ability to detect illnesses, reactions, and signs is critical to being capable of providing care to any patient, and the PA must be able to make these observations during routine appointments and checkups.

So how does a physician assistant learn to pay attention to these types of details? It is mainly through experience that a PA can detect signs of an allergic reaction in its early stages, but many of the PAs skills to pay attention to details were taught to them in a PA school. For example, PA programs teach the student the warning signs of particular diseases and reactions. Therefore, when a PA sees these signs, a light bulb should immediately light up, and the PA should look more closely at the patient for additional signs of that disease or reaction. For example, PA schools teach students that hives is a sign of an allergic reaction to an ingredient. So when a PA’s patient breaks out in hives, the PA should immediately look at all the medications that patient was on and take them off the ones that could have caused the reaction. Only a PA that pays close attention to details would be able to detect hives in the earliest stages.


Another reason why it is so important for professionals in a PA career to pay such close attention to details is to make sure things like that do not happen to begin with. The PA should pay close attention to the details in the patient’s medical record. Before prescribing any medications, the PA must be sure that they have not reacted with the active ingredients before. For example, if a patient had reacted to pseudoephedrine, the PA would not want to prescribe the pain medicine Aleve, but maybe instead prescribe Tylenol. These types of details need to be paid attention to on a daily basis, and it is one of the PAs responsibilities to make sure that no mistakes are made and that every patient is treated with the best , personal care possible.

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