Campbell University’s Physician Assistant Program is a 24-month graduate degree program with 12 months of didactic education and 12 months of supervised clinical experience. Upon successful completion of the program graduates will receive the Master of Physician Assistant Practice (MPAP) degree. The year-round program starts in late July. Graduation is also in July, following six semesters of study and training.
Curriculum and Assessment
The PA program curriculum is a block-based graduate medical education curriculum. The sequence of courses is designed to start with foundational courses in the basic sciences and subsequently build upon this content throughout the program. The didactic year courses teach clinical medicine, surgical and pharmacotherapeutic concepts. The year-long sequence of clinical skills courses provides hands on experiences for students to progressively develop critical thinking and clinical technical skills, through simulated patient encounters, use of task trainers, ultrasound training and many other hands-on learning opportunities. Curriculum content is integrated such that the study of topics in a specific clinical discipline such as cardiology, includes cardiology in clinical medicine, cardiology diagnostics such as EKG, cardiology experiential/ simulated exercises as well as cardiology pharmacotherapeutics. Assessment of student performance in the didactic year is based upon integrated unit exams (approximately three per block), written assignments, oral presentations and periodic professionalism self/ faculty-evaluations. All didactic courses are held on the health sciences campus.
The clinical faculty design schedules to ensure that each student receives the appropriate clinical settings for required types of patient encounters. Clinical rotations are four-week supervised clerkship experiences in the major disciplines, a seminar in evidence-based medicine, and two clinical electives. Evaluation of clinical-year students includes a preceptor assessment of performance. In addition, clinical faculty assess student progress at mid-rotation by reviewing required student-submitted electronic patient logs, and a student self-assessment to verify that each student has clinical exposure to key patient encounters and settings. Clinical year assessment of student learning outcomes includes several methods: written patient history and physicals, written progress notes, online multiple-choice exams, oral presentations to preceptors and faculty, and computer-based PAEA authored end-of-rotation exams. Students demonstrate practice specific competencies that include communication skills, obtaining a patient history, performing a physical exam, performing specific clinical procedures, critical appraisal of diagnostic tests, and development of a differential diagnosis and treatment plan by completing faculty observed standardized patient encounters and clinical skills labs.
All students complete all didactic elements in the program at the same time and complete all required clinical experiences during the second year. The only elective study available in this curriculum is in the second year when students may undertake supervised clinical experiences in two four-week rotations of their choosing.
Curriculum design and implementation are guided by the Standards of Accreditation for Physician Assistant Education, as published by the Accreditation Review Commission on Education for the Physician Assistant (ARC-PA). The ARC-PA accreditation standards describe the required curricular components and required supervised clinical experiences for a program to receive and maintain accreditation. The curriculum described is designed to meet these accreditation requirements.
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