The best bit of the job is definitely meeting people, chatting to them, gaining their trust and then caring for them to the best of my ability.
I consider it an honour to ‘put someone to sleep’ for their procedure – it’s such a big thing for patients. Having someone say “thank you” is amazing, not for the praise but because they’ve had a good experience.
One of the biggest challenges is that physicians' assistants can be seen as ‘cheap doctors’, or that we’re stealing doctors’ jobs, which isn’t the case at all! We work very differently and are here to add to the clinical team, not detract from it.
For example, being able to provide PICC lines for patients can mean the difference between having to wait up to several days on an emergency list and being able to go home sooner, which in turn leaves doctors free to concentrate on the more complex cases.