Female PAs—Where are we today?

Abstract

As the physician assistant (PA) profession celebrates its 50th birthday, we can be proud of the gains our profession has accomplished. However, despite the positive reports of job satisfaction, a marked increase in female PA leaders, and overall gains in PA compensation, a significant wage gap remains between male and female PAs. The PA profession is flourishing but it is time female PAs are paid equitably.

Burnout and Job and Career Satisfaction in the Physician Assistant Profession: A Review of the Literature

“…Length of training and burnout. Evaluate the length of training on burnout in the profession, including the infl uence of debt and worklife balance permitted by the profession [16].…”

“…In response to generational changes, economic demands, and shifts in societal norms and gender roles, the PA profession has undergone four major trends over the last three decades [16]: growth in the workforce, increased proportion of women in the profession, decline in the age of entry into the career, and movement toward specialty practice.…”

“…PAs currently comprise approximately 10 percent of the combined physician assistant/nurse practitioner (NP)/PA workforce [20, 21,22]. In its 2018 "Statistical Profi le on Certifi ed Physician Assistants," the NCCPA reports that the majority (20 percent) of certifi ed PAs practice in family and general medicine, followed by emergency medicine (13 percent), and orthopedic surgery (11 percent) Refl ecting the increase in women in higher education and in the workforce [16], the percentage of women in the PA profession has also steadily increased, from 31 percent in 1981 [23], to 68 percent of the workforce in 2018 [20]. Similarly, the age of entry has decreased over the past 20 years.…”

“…In 1984, 43 percent of fi rst-year students were older than 27 years at age of entry, compared to 39 percent in 2005 [24,25]. This may also refl ect the shifting demographics of the profession from veterans to a new workforce of health professionals [16].…”

The opportunity to lead facilitates PA professional well-being

“…Sex-based discrepancies in leadership responsibilities are in line with observations made by Curtis and colleagues that the ratio of female to male leaders in the PA profession was disproportionately low compared with the ratio of women to men in the PA workforce. 41 For example, 28% of the past presidents of the AAPA have been women, but 69.7% of practicing PAs are women. 42 Similar incongruities have been identified among physician leaders of national medical societies and academic medical departments.…”