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Physician associate acceptance rates

So having completed my Bsc in radiotherapy i am aiming for 2017 entry onto a physician associate program, as this is where i see myself, wanting greater medical involvement in patients lives than offered by radiotherapy.

I was therefore curious if anyone knows how competitive the physician associate courses are and what the acceptance rates are, i havent been able to find them published anywhere.
Thank you

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Reply 1

UKPAStudent

Hi there.

Firstly, fantastic that you're looking into becoming a Physician Associate!

So currently the Physician Associate role (and courses) are so new that there aren't any official statistics or established numbers on the number of applicants or successful offer rates currently. I'm sure in the coming years a list will be populated, most likely by individual institutions.

Speaking from my own experience, competition for places is growing quick. As the role becomes more well known more and more people are interested in becoming a PA. Currently demand is high, but I don't have any actual statistics. I know that there was an established waiting list for my cohort or 30 least year, with around 60 applicants on a waiting list in case one of us dropped out.

I know that this year competition was even higher, with several rounds of interviews taking place.

Reply 2

j_vicente

Original post by liam2210

Hey!

Thats great that you are thinking of becoming a PA! We need more people enthusiastic about the role.

Like it was said above, the courses are competitive, but not to the point of medicine since not many people know about it yet. In my year's cohort we had 80 applicants and 20 selected in the end.
I've talked to some of the people responsible for the selection process for PAs in my Uni (because I was curious about how competitive they believe it will become in the future) and I was told that they don't know when, but at some point they will start asking for the UKCAT or GAMSAT like all Medical degrees, because they predict it will have so many people applying and at such a high quality that they will need another differential.
So, if you are thinking about applying to the PA course, now is definitely the moment!
I hope you choose to join us :smile:

good luck in any potential application!

Reply 3

liam2210

Thanks guys, yeah really enthusiastic about the role, I guessed the entry rates would be competitive for such small intakes and so many people eligible to apply!!
I have been looking through the courses and it does seem encouraging the amount of universities that do or will start to offer this course.
Excited to get on a join this profession!!!