The PA Is In | Tracy Bingaman | Physician Assistant/Physician Associate/PA-C/PA-S/PA Student

In many areas of medicine, nurse practitioners practice alongside physician associates and physicians, are a vital member of the team, and play a similar role as PAs in the care of their patients. So, as PAs, should we feel threatened by NPs in a personal and professional capacity? Here’s the thing about healthcare - it’s not going anywhere - there are 99 million people in the United States withou...

Give it up for 10 magical and mundane years married! Dan and I are celebrating a decade of marriage and doing life in an imperfect partnership. We dive into what’s going well, our most annoying habits, how we share the mental and logistical load of working parenthood with 5 kids together on this episode. Pulling back the curtain, Dan shares what it was like to support me through burnout and how ou...

We hear a lot of PAs saying that they feel like they are underpaid, overworked and underappreciated at work. Whether it’s increased job responsibilities or new graduates in your area with zero experience making more money than you, the signs are all there. But how do you know specifically that it’s time for you to take the steps to renegotiate your salary and compensation package. I’m unpacking 7...

Is getting into a unique or rare specialty on your heart as a PA, but you feel like you just aren’t sure how to make that happen? Andrea Gamez is a Bone Marrow Transplant PA who shares her journey from Internal Medicine to BMT, and how her journey with travel and locum positions took her from New York to Texas, and Texas to Seattle, Washington. Press play to learn what Andrea loves about her job,...

Aesthetics - botox, neuromodulators, hyaluronic acid fillers, biostimulators, thread lifts and more. I’m sharing what it looks like to live a day in the life as an Aesthetics PA. My transition from traditional medicine into aesthetics came along with needing to reconcile my identity and separating who I am from what I do. I’ll unpack my favorite parts about my position in aesthetics as a Physician...

Being a PA in different positions comes with unique challenges, whether it’s administrative, the patients or the logistics of the hours and demands of the position. Finding a Unicorn job as a PA - where you love who you work with, what you do, and the hours and demands fit your current season of life - is a challenge, for sure. Melissa Kolowitz is a PA who, after becoming tapped out, drained and t...

I always wore full time working motherhood like a badge of honor. I worked full time for the first 10 years of my career as a surgery PA and during that time experienced healthcare burnout in a big way. When it was time to renegotiate my contract this year, instead of asking for more money I asked for fewer patient contact hours. On today’s episode I’m sharing how this decision changed myself, imp...

Is breaking into industry, landing a job as a medical science liaison (MSL), drug rep, or doing research been on your radar, but you feel like you haven’t understood the options and how to make it happen? Sarah Mowery is a Senior Conduct Project Manager and works in Clinical Trial Services where she helps the design, development and deployment of new clinical operations and therapeutic areas. She...

Want to receive feedback gracefully and gratefully? These four questions are the basis of turning negative feedback into positive professional change. Asking these questions of yourself, about the feedback you received, and where to go from here is a way that you can be intentional about improvement. What would it look like to take that feedback in stride and take it from frustrating to constructi...

Have you ever wondered what it’s like to practice medicine in another country… but the unknown of how to get licensed and how PAs are perceived by patients and treated by collaborating physicians is keeping you stuck? Let me introduce you to my friends Laura Juarez and Kimberly Weikel who are shining a light on the hurdles that Physician Associates wanting to serve the people of Puerto Rico are fa...

Take a peek behind the curtain to find… germs and a reminder of your (and my) humanity. Working parenthood meets medicine and the demands that come with both can be a stressful, anxiety-provoking situation. If you have young kids, ones that attend daycare, go to birthday parties or experience the outside world, your young kids are going to get sick. If you have a job and someone (or 20 patients) a...

When COVID happened, Amber realized that her pace of running, coaching, working as a Critical Care PA and burning the candle at both ends wasn’t sustainable. She pivoted into the field of functional medicine and has paired her love of health and wellness with her medicine experience.    Functional medicine is a root cause form of medicine. The functional medicine provider will work to un...

When I tell you about this secret weapon that I’ve been using in my career, that has landed me jobs, founded friendships and created connections, I mean it! I can’t keep something this good a secret, so I’m sharing all about networking on today’s episode. I’ve leveraged networking, but not in the way you think, at each and every turn of the winding road that has been my career as a PA. Okay, okay,...

If you’re going to make a decision about something, that decision should be well informed. Just like reviewing an informed consent with a patient where we cover the risks, benefits and alternatives, you should understand what you’re missing out on if you aren’t a member of the AAPA. These are the top 7 benefits to being a member of the AAPA and why getting plugged into the network and advocacy eff...

There are less than 200 PAs working in the US in Radiation Oncology and Joann Timberlake is one of those. Starting a job in a new specialty, especially one so sparsely populated with PAs, is intimidating. Luckily Joann was willing to share with us how she broke into this role, transitioned out of the ER and into Rad Onc and what that process was like for her. I wanted to invite her on the podcast...

My VA slack messaged me “I don’t want to freak you out…but….Is it just me or is there no sound on today’s podcast episode? I tried listening on Apple Podcasts & also on YouTube but I don’t hear anything.” I published a SILENT Podcast episode last week & the experience was all together incredibly humbling.  Do you know what making a mistake in publishing my own podcast makes me? It’s n...

Well the PA Profession has done it again. PA is named as the #2 profession in the healthcare sector and #4 overall for all professions in the 2023 U.S. News & World Report. Dive into how these rankings are generated, what they are based upon, and the predictions that exist for the growth of the PA profession in the coming ten years. The reality is that these rankings, although they provide inc...

For me, whenever I learn the numbers, the logic or the formulas behind something, I immediately believe it and buy into it on a deeper level. It feels so much more concrete to me and not so arbitrary. One thing that I’ve been super interested in and invested in over the year is learning how to better manage my money and invest it wisely. There is a LOT of advice on the internet (looking at you Ins...

I heard this from the mouth of a PA with 20-years of experience last week "but there are new grads out there who are willing to work for so much less than I am". & I couldn't help but share my thoughts about how we can encourage new graduates to advocate for themselves and how to dismantle this limiting belief that you shouldn't ask for a raise because someone else will do it for less.  5...

For years, I’ve thought that working for the VA could be really limiting for PAs, not because I actually knew that for a fact, but because to me, Veterans Affairs was synonymous with bureaucracy and red tape and I *incorrectly* assumed that would be limiting for PAs. Erin Willard is here to set me straight and share with you all about her Unicorn PA Position in surgery at the VA. When COVID coinci...

Let's meet up - LIVE and online - for the Masterclass: 4 Secrets of High Income-Earning PAs  MASTERCLASS REGISTRATION www.tracybingaman.com/masterclass

A sneak peek inside the 4 Secrets Masterclass I'm offering right now LIVE -- register at www.tracybingaman.com/masterclass -- to join us for one of the live sessions. Hope on, learn for 45-minutes, ask questions and get them answered live and in person!  Secret 2: High Income Earning PAs Know How to Rock Difficult Conversations Let's face it, difficult conversations, arguments, confrontation...

Benjamin George, working as a Psychiatry PA-C in Texas, has mastered the art of adding value, strategic moves and crafting your own Unicorn position as a PA. After working in inpatient Psych, a position opened up in the ER with his ideal schedule - Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday 12-hour shifts - and he jumped at the chance to apply. Ben was selected for that position over more senior colleagues bec...

I’m going to share with you the three types of Negotiators that exist in the world. We will dive into each type of negotiator and I’ll share the characteristics of that person, how they may be perceived, what they care about during a negotiation and more. You’ll be able to see what type of negotiator YOU are, and also super valuable, if you know your physician, practice administrator or administra...

The One Sheet of Paper You Need for Your Next Negotiation Studies show that preparation significantly improves negotiation outcomes. But how exactly do you prepare for your next PA salary negotiation?  You should be able to jot down a handful of key pieces of data, desires and strategies, practice them and feel confident walking into any negotiation. I'll walk you through the One Sheet, what...