Written by Kim Cook, MS, PA-C
Director of Clinical Education

The Program is very pleased to have more than 10 new rural clinical partners in the 4-state area, in the disciplines of Family Medicine/Urgent Care, Women’s Health, and Psychiatry. We are very grateful for our ongoing partnerships with so many clinicians in the area, many of whom take multiple students for rotations year-after-year. Each year we are pleased that more and more of our alumni become active preceptors, and this year is no different.

It’s very exciting for us when our students are precepted by former students. One alumni who became a new preceptor this year was Kelley Menefee, PA-C, ATC. Kelley practices in orthopedic surgery with her collaborative physician, Dr. Dolce, in Ft. Worth, Texas. We were very pleased to have Kelley precept Rachel Peth for her Directed rotation.

We also love it when clinical students drop by to say hi during their clinical year. We miss them!

As has always been done in the past, the faculty continues to review and revise the clinical curriculum and work to enhance assessment processes.   This is done with internal evaluations, as well as alumni feedback.  A couple of changes that have been made this year are: several new presentations have been added to the return-to-campus days at the end of each rotation, and the students now have an OSCE at every EOR call-back experience. Another addition has been student presentations at EOR.

The Program partnered with Mercy again this year for the annual Sports Physicals clinic in Aurora, Missouri. This was a fun, successful event as it has been many years in the past. The students performed over 150 sports physicals for Aurora-area student athletes. Our students really enjoy the interaction with the athletes, and it’s a great opportunity for them to practice establishing rapport with adolescents. Depending on where the students are placed for their Clinical Practicum experience, it is sometimes the main experience our students have with children and adolescent patients. The Mercy clinicians that served as preceptors for this year’s event were all from the Emergency Department at Mercy Hospital in Aurora; they were: Dr. Jeffery Diehl, Dr. Travis Hawks, and Jared Pendergrass, PA-C and MSU alumni.

Clinical Practicum I, which is the 2-week rotation students do at the end of their summer semester, went very well this year. Students were placed with preceptors in various disciplines, primarily in the greater Springfield area. The majority of these preceptors are MSU Physician Assistant alumni. We are very grateful that we have so much support and willingness of our former students to want to help train their future colleagues.

Clinical Rotation #MedLifeMonday Facebook Features:

• Hannah Garrad
• Anna Biernbaum
• Sarah Phillips
• Gerri Idos
• Leah Krafft
• Cassidy McCandless

 

 

 

 

 

Written by Nathan Miracle, MS, PA-C
Director of Didactic Education

The summer semester brought for our students a heavy dose of medicine (no pun intended)! They traversed eight sections of Clinical Medicine in just 9 weeks, where they began to learn the nuts and bolts of medical knowledge and application. Pharmacotherapeutics introduced them to a whole new vocabulary as they learned hundreds of medications and their applications. The student’s physical exam skills were bolstered by learning special examination techniques including male and female GU examination. We are very thankful for our new partnership with the University of Missouri Simulation Center, here in Springfield, which allowed our students the opportunity to practice these examinations on standardized patients without having to leave the area. For our alumni, you can appreciate how beneficial this experience is and to not have to travel four hours away to complete this experience is such a blessing! While the summer semester went by in a flash our students still found opportunity to get together in the great outdoors and expend some pent up energy, either on the sand volleyball courts or around a spikeball net. As they move into their final semester of didactic education, our students will be provided with more opportunities to further their medical knowledge, learn clinical procedure techniques, and further their knowledge of pharmacology as they prepare for their next phase of education. This portion of their education will culminate in a White Coat Ceremony on December 10^th where our students, with friends and family in attendance, will recite the Physician Assistant Oath and be given their white laboratory coats symbolizing their transition into their clinical phase of education. The faculty and staff of the MSU PA department look forward, with great anticipation, to helping this cohort complete their didactic phase of PA education this fall semester!

Class of 2023 links:

• Clinical Medicine I with dermatology inspired cookie art (post found within facebook page)
• Licensing Presentations
• First OR Procedures Lab
• Didactic Student Scoop Kaci Hultz
• Didactic Student Scoop Sadie Turner
• Didactic Student Scoop Gabriela Sappington
• Didactic Student Scoop Ashleigh Sharkey
• Didactic Student Scoop Samuel Wilson
• Didactic Student Scoop Courtney Weatherford
• Didactic Student Scoop Ryan Liddell
• Didactic Student Scoop Olivia Eikel

The 2022-2023 application cycle officially closed on July 15, 2022, resulting in a very competitive, high-quality applicant pool with more than 720 prospective applicants including 326 verified applications. After thorough review by the Admissions Committee, sixty-four candidates received interview invitations. Throughout the month of September interview candidates will be invited to campus for Pre-Interview Orientations held each Thursday followed by individual interviews with Admission Committee members on Friday.

A note of thanks to the many volunteers from both the didactic and clinical cohorts who will facilitate pre-interview orientation student Q&A panels and facility tours.

Thanks to the MSU Advisory Board members who assist with interviewing hopeful candidates. Your dedication to the excellence of MSU PA program and the quality of the PA profession is appreciated.

Written by Roberto Canales, DHSc, MS, PA-C
MSU PA Department Head/Program Director

PAS continues to grow and make changes to meet the mission and goals of the program. The PA accreditation organization recently approved the program’s request to expand the class size from 30 up to 36 students beginning January 2023.  PAS recently updated it’s Become a Preceptor section of the website to reflect 1) the new Missouri Preceptor Tax Credit, 2) the department’s ability to provide a Faculty Appointment to eligible clinical preceptors, and 3) award CME Category I to eligible PA trained clinical preceptors. Catch up on PAS Department News below:

• Become a clinical preceptor
• PAS Staff Appreciation
• Celebrating Associate Professor Shannon Hauschildt’s birthday (post found within facebook page)
• Springfield News-Leader article featuring PA clinical student Cassidy McCandless

 

If you missed the last PAS newsletter, you could view it here: Spring 2022 Newsletter

Written by Kim Cook, MS PA-C
Director of Clinical Education

2022 has been going well for the current clinical cohort. Students are out there making us and our profession proud. Some students have already been pleasantly surprised by how much they have liked certain rotations that they didn’t necessarily think were going to be their area of primary interest. It’s very refreshing to see their excitement when they come back to campus for end-of-rotation activities, and they tell us what all they have been getting to experience.

While the past couple of years have been trying due to challenges with clinical sites due to the covid pandemic, with the support of our clinical partners, we have persevered. Not only have we made it through those tough times with the long-standing clinical partnerships we’ve had, but we have actually made a lot of new partnerships as well. We have been very pleased at the number of alumni that have joined in to support the program and began teaching our students through preceptorships. We have had more alumni than ever become involved in other ways also. One example was an oral presentation workshop we had during clinical orientation before the clinical year began this year. Alumni came to campus and acted as proctors while students practiced giving oral presentations. I believe the Program will continue to flourish with such support from such a wide array of clinicians, both locally and at distant locations as well.

In the past year, we have had students at a lot of our core rotation facilities in the Springfield area, and as always, we have had students at distant rotations as well (several of which are new sites).

In the last year we have added fifty-three new preceptors/rotation sites, including twenty alumni preceptors. We are very grateful and proud of our alumni who have become a part of our community clinical partners and have precepted in 2021-2022.

We continue to get wonderful feedback from our preceptors about our students. Here are a few examples of the wonderful comments we get about our students:

“I have been working with students for about 25 years and I would have to say my current student has been one of my favorite students, if not the top! They have a maturity sometimes not seen at their age. They performed well clinically and were able to easily develop a rapport with patients and staff. I had many positive comments from patients regarding their bedside manner. They would do an awesome job in family medicine or whatever specialty they decide to go into. I wish I had an opening at my office!”

“By far, one of the best students I have had in 26 years. Always early, never complained. Excellent bedside manner. They relate very well with staff, patients and families. I would hire this student without hesitation. They will be an excellent asset to any healthcare team they join.”

“By far the best student I have had for a first rotation. Showed enthusiasm to continue to learn. My patients and staff loved them. Hopefully look forward to working with them in the future.”

Class of 2022 Spring Student Spotlights:

Taylor Heimann Spotlight
Trevor Moore Spotlight

Clinical Rotation #MedLifeMonday Facebook Features:

Sarah Phillips
Leah Krafft
Sarah Dobard
Megan Bekas
Payden Shapland
Miranda Ruth
Joshua Trammell
Mallory Brothers