Okay to start this discussion I would like to first explain and introduce myself. I'm a 22 year old male Firefighter who has been on the job for about a year and a half now. As everyone probably knows, firefighters are required to be at least EMTS. Ever since I start my schooling to become an AEMT I have throughly enjoyed the medical side and the one thing that I just love the most about my job is seeing a young patient who for example is so scared of something EMS related that you are there to show them compassion and to calm there nerves and show them that there is nothing to worry about. I can't begin to explain how heart warming this brings me and enjoyment/satisfaction. I can't say I feel the same about the fire side. I can go into a whole discussion explaining why I dislike the fire side but this is not what I am here for other then to try to purse what I love so I can enjoy something I am going to love doing. A little more about myself, I am what you call a fitness freak and by freak I mean like I take care of myself like its no tomorrow. I workout 6 days a week, Meal plan/Prep my food for the week and I take fish oil Pill and flaxseed oil Pill for my health. Now you can easily see that my ultimate passion would be something fitness related like opening up a gym or getting some form or degree in fitness but there is just no good use in any of that in todays world. Now to my main issue, I have been throughly considering going to college for a nursing degree but the only thing that is holding me back are (and I will list them)
1. Working long hours to the point that I won't be able to workout anymore
2. I love the aspect of nursing but what i dislike is the bathing patients and helping them pee. Thats the only things that just thoroughly don't interest me.
3. Worried that my loan debt will be too much or more then what I will make
Now a few weeks back I thought I found the career I wanted which was a CRNA until I realized the amount of schooling that it requires and the amount of loan debt I will be in and that just does not seem worth it in my view. I'm just trying to find a career that will not take up more then 6 years of my life that will pay decent (not looking to make 100k plus a year) and has a decent retirement. I love the medical field and I have had nurses and doctors in my family but for me I just don't wanna be in school for more then 8 years to finally start my career cause as you can probably tell I wanna eventually quit the fire department and have a career that I will love more then anything and thats why I was looking into cardiovascular nurse but i'm just not quite sure what I wanna do in the medical field per say. I was also looking into becoming a PA but then I heard that this career field would be a bad choice and is far from worth it. I am still living at home with my parents which still makes me feel like a huge bum and is causing me so much stress. I just wanna move out and get my career started but as you can tell I am stuck and I am hoping anyone can give me some advice. I would appreciate anything. Thanks everyone!
PAs and NPs have basically the same requirements as far as practice is concerned depending on the state you live in. One is medical the other is said to be a nursing foundation. All total 8 years seems to be about the standard. I would be very careful about getting an ADN; it's very difficult to find a job with an ADN. I know that some ADNs to land a job but the field is in such a flux . In two more years I'm not so sure where it will be but when you think about the requirement of 80% of nurses must hold BSN to be hired for hospitals. Neither is the pay all that good especially here in the South unless you work a lot of hours and then you can't further your education or do all the work outs that you want to do. Good luck with your choices.
Not every PA program requires a bachelor's degree or six total years of school--there's a lot to check out regarding that career path. I really think the OP would be unhappy as a nurse or nursing student. And NPs aren't necessarily "more free" than PAs--there's a lot of variability by state and practice setting. Do make sure you get your information from actual PAs, college programs, and doctors who employ PAs--there's a lot of misinformation out there. I only know that because I once took an immersion class for a week that included two PAs, and they explained a lot of things to me!
From what I have experienced, NPs and PAs have similar, if not identical, clinical practice. Whether an NP can practice without physician supervision depends on the state. In mine, there must be collaborative agreement between an NP and MD/DO. What this "supervision" looks can be highly variable. The NP in my clinic practices pretty independently. Sometimes she is the only provider in the clinic. When she rounds in the hospital, however, the physician usually reviews her note and plan of care, but she still sees the patients alone. Other arrangements exist. Honestly, I would appreciate the collaboration. NP education (or PA education) does not provide you with enough knowledge or experience to treat very complicated patients, so to have a physician resource is invaluable.
I chose to go to (D)NP school over PA because generally you can do a lot more with nursing. Nurses are involved in research, teaching, program development, quality improvement, the list goes on. A PA is typically only used in the treatment of patients. I love patient care but I know I will want to branch out my career eventually. The DNP gIves me the most options.
Cost is highly variable but it is pretty common to find employer sponsored tuition reimbursement in nursing. Nothing like that exists for PAs that I am aware of.
"... I'm throughly thinking about going the PA route cause I believe this will be my only option for a field I can enjoy after 6 years of schooling. I just need to go an shadow a PA to fully understand it better.
Wait. Just a couple of hours ago you stated that you were going to go the NP route as opposed to PA because of autonomy.
But now it's PA and not NP? Huh? >scratches head
I get it. A degree path is a tough choice, and so much is on the line. Good luck to you. Keep digging up information, and think long term in what is best for you.
Thank you for responding to my post and giving me your advice which is appreciated just like everyone else are. I would like for you and everyone else who has respectively responded to my post understand that for right now I am currently pondering on to get my bachelor degree in nursing so I will have a bachelor degree and then get my experience and while getting my experience and hours, hopefully meet all the requirements to get into a PA school like EMORY would be a choice if possible right now. I believe they are really expensive but for right now they are the only PA school I can find here in Georgia but I will keep looking. From what I understand PA schools don't require a specific bachelor degree but just require a bachelor degree in something and I believe a nursing degree would be a great fit/start for my medical career especially being an AEMT right now.
See the reason why I keep switching back and forth is cause I keep reading about the requirements about becoming a PA and how tough it is just to get into the school. Stuff like that really scares me cause I hear people talking about have better then the minimum requirements and still not getting accepted in and Im not going to sit here and tell you I'm the smartest guy out there cause I am far from that but what I can say is that I am a hard worker and I am willing to work for something. I am just nervous that I will not get accepted into PA school no matter how well I do. Sorry for the sob story.
As I was reading your message, the thought popped into my head that being a PA might be a great choice! Look at it this way, the time will pass any way, and you will then gave a great career. The market for PAs will be huge in upcoming years...
Here's the thing, anything worth anything takes hard work, sacrifice and taking the good with the bad! Nothing is perfect and YES every now and then there will be pee!
Maybe I really lucked out here, but I am an RN with no debt. I obtained my RN at community college (about $1.5k per semester) while working as a PCA in a hospital. Thankfully, my experience as a PCA, waitress, and a fortuitous 'connection' at a magnet status hospital is allowing me to start work as an RN with my online RN to BSN tuition fully reimbursed. Yay for no debt!!! It can be done!
Here's a larger issue I see with your predicament. Being a PCA, I bathed patients all day err day and let me tell you I know a thing or two about pee. Being a nurse, I'm still going to have to do bathes and change diapers if I'm doing my job right. If this is a deal breaker for you, becoming a nurse will be hard. If it makes you feel any better though, nobody actually likes working with pee. It's not like all nurses just have a calling that they love bathing people and changing diapers and you are the exception. It's just something that comes with the job. It'd be easy to overcome with the right attitude and then somewhere down the line, maybe you'll find a specialty where you don't deal with it as much. Like in the ER?
The comments are on here are driving me insane and I feel your fruatration from people giving responses that are unhelpful and misjudging your original point and the important and wise advice you are genuinely seeking and hoping somebody can provide. Im not saying I have the answers and I know it all...but I would really love to talk to you and tell you what I think is the wisest thing to do based on my research and experience throughout my own life. It wont let me private message you. So frustrating. Find me on fb. Hannah Hickerson is my name from Michigan (just moved here from orange county, CA). I care and think i could help you and offer good things to consider. I want you to suceed and learn from my mistakes and my wisdom. Or shoot me some "hot mail"at Hannahhickerson. Im trying not to put my specific emailing address down because i dont want them to detect it on this site and immediately erase it or say i cant provide that info. I provided enough hints that im sure u can figure out how to reach me. Hope to hear from u. :)
I can't begin to tell you how insightful your post was because it not only made me rethink my degree route but most likely helped me choose my path cause from what I understand a PA works under a doctors scope while a NP is more free. In my eyes that seems more like the job for me since I do not want to have to worry about working under someone to the point that every little thing I do might be wrong while I understand a NP still works under a doctor, I believe they have more freedom compared to a PA (correct me if I am wrong.)
Honestly when I said i did not want to deal with the poop,pee and baths was because I felt like thats all nurses did and yes that was very naive of me but I am glad I had some great posts here explain thats not all nurses do. Of course it will suck like you said dealing with it but at least some point down my career I can advance and hopefully not deal with it as much.
My question for you would be do you recommended me just getting my associates in nursing first and find a job at a hospital and look into some scholarship programs they might have that could possibly help me reach my secondary goal of getting my bachelors in nursing? Also can you please explain to me what would be the difference between 2 year nurse vs a 4 year nurse?
Im planning on hopefully attending Gordon State College here in Georgia for my Associates in Nursing cause I think it will be the cheapest route. Correct me if I am wrong but wouldn't the cheaper route be to become a NP other then a PA and no I am not looking to find the easy way out, Im just trying to compare the two. Thanks!!
In my state, I would recommend going though an associates program first to save money. Most employers in my state will still hire an ADN nurse and encourage a bachelor's degree. I can't say how other states hire. There are some hospitals that will not hire if you don't have a bachelors, so look into the hospitals in your area before you male the decision. If they will hire an associates most make you get a BSN within a certain number of years, but have tuition reimbursement programs.
The difference between an associates degree and a bachelor's degree is the theory. Both programs will teach you the basics of how to be a nurse and educate you enough to pass the NCLEX, but the BSN program has extra classes about nursing theory. In my state the BSN is one more year than the ADN. The community college in my city is now offering a combo ADN-bsn route when you graduate from the cc you have a bsn. If your community collegend does something like that, it might be worth it. You work through the summers and graduate in 2 years with a BSN- I'm not sure of the cost, but it'd be different in your state.
NP vs PA I would just research the difference and the scope of practice for your state. NP'S can practice without a doctor, but I believe that in some states they do still need a MD... I haven't researched every state, I just know a little about my own and what I want to do with it. Your best bet would be to research and shadow both.
Finance wise, from my calculations in my state, the NP is way cheaper. However, PA schooling is brick and mortar, is basically a mini med school, and they don't recommend you work during the program whereas NP school is online and you pick the specialty of NP you desire-FNP ect. [All the NP's our there chime in]
And you can still work as an RN during NP schooling.
The comments are on here are driving me insane and I feel your fruatration from people giving responses that are unhelpful and misjudging your original point and the important and wise advice you are genuinely seeking and hoping somebody can provide. Im not saying I have the answers and I know it all...but I would really love to talk to you and tell you what I think is the wisest thing to do based on my research and experience throughout my own life. It wont let me private message you. So frustrating. Find me on fb. Hannah Hickerson is my name from Michigan (just moved here from orange county, CA). I care and think i could help you and offer good things to consider. I want you to suceed and learn from my mistakes and my wisdom. Or shoot me some "hot mail"at Hannahhickerson. Im trying not to put my specific emailing address down because i dont want them to detect it on this site and immediately erase it or say i cant provide that info. I provided enough hints that im sure u can figure out how to reach me. Hope to hear from u. :)
Oka-ay.
First of all, many of us understand OP's dilemma and are suggesting different ideas that OPcan look into. OP has even thanked many of us for the advice.
Second- if you have good advice for us all then you should feel free to post it here so that future forum readers can learn from it. No one is here to criticize those with advice unless it is inappropriate, dangerous, or against the rules.
Which brings me to issue 3. AN policies strongly discourage people giving out personal information. It allows people to to find out who youare and if you complain about someone in the future, we will know who you are talking about. It is also really dangerous for both you and OP.
BTW, you may have to post on AN a certain amount of times before you can start PM. I see you have been a long time lurker (I was one too and had trouble with PM when I first started posting ) but you haven't really posted. If you are really hesitant about making your posts public, I believe that others are able to PM you until you figure out the PM issue.
the4ofus
44 Posts
PAs and NPs have basically the same requirements as far as practice is concerned depending on the state you live in. One is medical the other is said to be a nursing foundation. All total 8 years seems to be about the standard. I would be very careful about getting an ADN; it's very difficult to find a job with an ADN. I know that some ADNs to land a job but the field is in such a flux . In two more years I'm not so sure where it will be but when you think about the requirement of 80% of nurses must hold BSN to be hired for hospitals. Neither is the pay all that good especially here in the South unless you work a lot of hours and then you can't further your education or do all the work outs that you want to do. Good luck with your choices.