More than 100 Duke Physician Assistant (PA) Program faculty, students, and alumni attended the 2023 American Academy of Physician Associates' (AAPA) conference in Nashville, Tenn.
(For more information about AAPA's name change, click here)
Duke PA Program faculty and alumni led sessions and presented on various subjects including academic, social justice, and clinical topics.
Student Anabel Caceres said she particularly enjoyed a talked given by Program Director Jacqueline Barnett, DHSc, MHS, PA-C, called “Sojourner Syndrome in Black Women PAs and Patients.”
She said, "It taught me new things about disparities that are happening specifically to black women."
Other sessions led by faculty and alumni included:
Quincy Jones, MSW, MHS, PA-C, and Lorraine Anglin, MHS, PA-C, presented "Primary Care Approach to Hepatitis C Virus Treatment."
Nick Hudak, Ph.D., Mpa, Msed, PA-C, presented "Predictors of Physician Assistant Student Mistreatment Reporting," based on his recent Ph.D. dissertation and fellowship.
Associate Program Director April Stouder, MHS, PA-C, and former faculty member Alicia Bolden, DMSc., MPH, PA-C, presented "PAs Go Beyond: From Clinic to Classroom to Beyond."
Alumna Sarah (Hall) Cooper ('12) presented "Updates in Sickle Cell Disease Management."
Alumnus Adely Wong ('13) presented "Acute Tubular Necrosis" and "Nothing 'Basic' About It: Adventures with Basic Metabolic Panel."
Recent graduate Dani Kessler ('22) presented the poster, "Acceptability of a novel, student-led near-peer teaching (NPT) program for physician assistant (PA) students."
The Student Experience
Though much of the conference is geared towards practicing PAs and offers many options to fulfill continuing education credits, the organization has actively encouraged students to participate in the academy since its founding in 1968. From Challenge Bowl and the iScan competition to networking and job negotiation skills, the conference not only gives students a chance to show their talents – but it also serves them well in establishing their future careers.
Student (PA-S) Nicholas Hallam said he loved the networking opportunities – especially the ones for Emergency Medicine and Cardiothoracic Surgery.
Chris Marshall (PA-S) echoed this, saying, "' Taking Names and Making Connections' was a great networking event."
Diana Le (PA-S) said, "I enjoyed going to the Strategies for Securing and Negotiating the Ideal Position seminar by Anne Wildermuth PA-C, where I learned about how to negotiate salaries and benefits."
Challenge Bowl
This year's National Medical Challenge Bowl featured 89 schools going head-to-head to demonstrate their health care knowledge. The challenge bowl is a well-attended event with the feel of a sports arena. There is nothing subdued about it as students dress in collegiate gear, lead school chants, and pass around pots and tubes of face paint in school colors. Students held the occasional pompom and foam finger in the air as everyone took their seats.
Second-year students Ashley Toscano, Zoe Couse, and Stella Wong competed for the Duke PA Program.
iScan
The iScan competition pits groups of students against each other as they demonstrate their practical knowledge of point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS). The Duke teams, led by students Alex Filiput and Erica Palmer, made it to the second round of play and ended up in 5th and 6th place. Additionally, Palmer won the Society of Point of Care Ultrasound (SPOCUS) Student Golden Probe Award for outstanding student leadership at the iScan competition.
Palmer said, "After participating in this event last year, I reached out to the Society of Point of Care Ultrasound (who puts on iScan every year) to see if I could help out with anything, and started writing their newsletter."
Palmer said she plans to continue her involvement in future iScan competitions as an instructor and that "participating in iScan and the opportunities it has opened up have played a huge part in me securing a position in the field of critical care after graduation."
Anabel Caceres was elected regional director of the Student Alliance for PAs for Latino Health. This group is the official caucus within AAPA that supports the health and health care of Latinos in the United States.
She said, "I'm so excited to work with other Student Alliance members to work towards addressing health disparities within LatinX communities."
AAPA works with student association representatives to facilitate the often-complicated logistics of getting dozens of students to the annual conference. The representatives elected for the class of 2024 are Chris Marshall and Liz Shipman. They assisted in registrations, hotel bookings, and other official and unofficial student activities for the conference.
With more than 7,300 conference attendees spread over two conference locations and a dozen hotels, one could go the entire weekend only running into a handful of friends and associates. The Duke PA Program hosts an annual student and alumni reception to allow the whole Duke PA family to gather together. More than 100 faculty, students, and alumni attended this year's reception. The alumni in attendance represented six decades of PA education.
Caceres said, "I really enjoyed the Duke PA Alumni Reception. It was so nice to connect with Duke graduates and learn more about where they're practicing now. It was also nice to congratulate our graduates from the 70s and 80s!"
Students and faculty used their free time to check out Nashville sites such as the Country Music Hall of Fame, the National Museum of African American Music, and the live music emanating from the many honky-tonks along Broadway. While some conference events - such as the student and alumni reception - came complete with free food, attendees also filled up on nearby options such as barbecue and Nashville's staple hot chicken. Iconic hot chicken restaurant Hattie B's, was a favorite of many students, though one student did suggest staying away from the hottest option unless you want to cry in front of your classmates.
To my knowledge, the largest number of fellow PAs and PA students in the world convene each year at the AAPA conference for networking, learning, support, advocacy, and collegiality. This year's conference was special as it really felt like we are finally coming out of COVID-19. The program was able to send 70+ students, faculty and staff who participated in various activities. Of course, one of the highlights was hosting the wonderful DPAP Alumni Reception, where we celebrated our amazing alumni who continue to model and live the mission of the Duke PA Program through their clinical practice, service, advocacy, and leadership. We are DPAP Proud! - Program Director Jacqueline Barnett, DHSc, MHS, PA-C
Project Access
One way in which students and faculty used the conference as an opportunity to live the Duke PA Program mission was through the Project Access program. Parker Afari (PA-S) and Director of Diversity and Inclusion/Recruiting Lovest Alexander, Jr., MHS, PA-C, DFAAPA, joined the African Heritage PA Caucus in two Project Access events, reaching more than 100 middle and high school students.
According to its website, Project Access is "a long-standing initiative supported by AAPA and the Physician Assistant Education Association (PAEA) where PAs and PA students visit middle and high schools to talk to historically marginalized minority students about the PA profession."
Alexander said the students were very engaged in the presentation. He said, “We gave a history of the profession and explained to them what PAs do. We gave some health tips and talked about some anatomical parts of the body and sports injuries. [...] We had them listen to our hearts and lungs with our stethoscopes.”
The African Heritage PA Caucus also awarded Afari the Prentiss L. Harrison Memorial Scholarship. The scholarship is named after the first Black physician assistant, and 1968 Duke PA Program graduate, Prentiss L. Harrison.
Students also volunteered with Project C.U.R.E. packing medical supplies to donate to resource-starved hospitals in developing countries.
Head on over to Instagram for a lot more great photos!
The 2024 AAPA conference will be held May 18-22 in Houston, Texas.