A Profession and Its History: Important Lessons if We Take Time To Listen

by David Mittman, PA - August 4, 2009

RELATED LINKS   PA History Center at the Eugene Stead Center

Provided by Clinician 1

A few weeks ago when I knew I was going to be in the area, I stopped into the PA History Center at the Eugene Stead Center in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina http://www.pahx.org/ . I made an appointment with the historian who works there and stopped by. She is a wonderful lady. We had not previously met but I had donated more than a few things over the years, and wanted to see if the place was all I hoped for. The quick answer is the Center has much to offer. Because of the great staff and the significance to where we as a profession have collectively come from, and where I believe where we are going, I was more than impressed. There are photos of many of the original PAs and Medex graduates, early magazines and journals and even a recreation of Dr. Stead’s office from Duke. Stories about the early days of PA practice and audio interviews with many of the professions trailblazers. In the Garden you will find a bronze statue of a Viet Nam era medic treating a wounded soldier, donated by a PA to honor all of the medics that became PAs.

“No big deal” you say. Why does this place matter? I believe that to know where we are going, we have to be able to see and as importantly get a feel where we came from. This goes for both PAs and NPs. PAs have to see that the name of our profession was physician’s associate, and not just see it in some history book but by seeing people’s name tags and diplomas that held this title. Our colleagues need to see how first tens then hundreds and later thousands of people kept breaking barriers just so they could practice and usually these battles needed to be done state by state. Many times we fought the medical or nursing societies, sometimes both. Our ability to practice, to prescribe, to sign one form or another, all were battles that had to be won fifty times over. And these battles made many of todays battles pale by comparison. Again, “so what” some would say. Ancient history.

We must realize that the nurse practitioner and PA professions are getting older and for many of us that have been around a few decades or more, that’s a great blessing. When that happens though, the people who were really the ones who made history happen get old, some unfortunately pass on, and with them the real stories of how the beginning of both professions were birthed and nurtured are forever lost. There needs to be a place that both honors the people who were blazing the trails and more importantly honors the work they did to get us where we are today. I love my profession and because of that love I am openly critical of many of our shortcomings. I know we can do things better. Going to the PA Museum made me realize this even more. By looking at how far we have come and the risks the early PAs took, how could we not strive to do even better now?

We can’t and should not live in the past, but neither can we afford to forget it. I meet many students today who are to put it mildly unaware that we even have a history. They think we were always “assistants”. They think we were always able to prescribe. They think that PAs and NPs always made excellent salaries and were always found practicing in almost every specialty. They do not realize that the day they join the profession, they carry a legacy. Part of that legacy is that the NP and PA professions were started by people who wanted to radically change healthcare delivery across the USA. This included forward thinking physicians taking central leadership roles at the very beginning, Dr. Stead at Duke and Dr. Silver at University of Colorado. Duke’s first PA class was taught by physicians and what we would now call advanced practice nurses. Nursing was significantly involved in the first PA class. They knew what they were doing. They also realized that we were all intertwined in this and once the PA was born there would be no turning back. I suspect that Dr. Loretta Ford and Dr. Silver knew the same fact. Graduate a class let them lose on the world and let’s keep pushing. Neither profession has stopped pushing since.

I have not heard of an NP museum that is national in scope. I would donate to that enterprise because it is needed. I would also ask you to donate to the PA History Center for the many reasons I have outlined above. We need to know and preserve our own history to understand just how amazing a journey the last 40 years has been. I salute all of the PAs and the state and national organizations that worked so hard to create the Center and ask all of you to write a check for any amount possible and send it over. The staff needs the support and I want to make sure there are people around to chronicle the next 40 years. If I have anything to do with it, we will have even more amazing things that will need to be chronicled. Both professions need a place like this.

Click here to donate: http://www.formsite.com/aapa2/historysocietydonation/secure_index.html 

Thanks,
Dave 
 

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