Anatomy for physician assistants: how we tackle this beast

Although Physician Assistants (PA) are dependent medical practitioners, they practice medicine with a degree of autonomy requiring a knowledge base of sufficient breadth and depth to function as primary care providers. Factual knowledge in the basic sciences must at a minimum allow for effective examination of patients, performance of common technical skills, interpretation of common imaging studies, and of course, safe medical practice. The USC Primary Care PA Program of the Keck School of Medicine delivers a 6 unit integrated Basic Medical Sciences (BMS) course to first year PA students during the first semester of a six‐semester program. Anatomy (33% of BMS) covers regional and radiographic anatomy, and introductory histology. Learners also rotate through four, 2‐hour prosection‐driven cadaver laboratory sessions. The remainder of the BMS course is comprised of systems physiology (52%), and adjunct topics (15%) (eg. introductory genetics and pathology). Course objectives for anatomy were derived from a mix of published standard‐setting documents for medical students and the course director's clinical and academic experience. Learning strategies include lecture, assigned readings, audiovisual resources, and cadaver laboratory. The course is taught by a PA‐PhD, and laboratory sessions are taught by Biokinesiology and Physical Therapy anatomy faculty.