Is a surgical fellowship worth it for a PA with experience?
For context: Neurosurgery PA with almost 3 years experience. Operate out of a small community hospital in the northeast. Mostly spine with occasional cranial surgeries. Primarily outpatient clinic with avg 1 OR day a week. I’ve had some inpatient experience but I had basically no formal training and minimal help.
My dilemma comes from a place that I feel I’m not learning/utilizing a lot of the skills I should be using as a PA who’s been in a surgical specialty since graduating. A lot of it is attributed to our limited patient population, which makes it difficult to see most of the disorders I read about. The other is a lack of training from the attendings who are great but have not had the bandwidth to help teach me, especially when I was just starting. Any attempts to take time that they promised me when I was hired for them to teach me have fallen through. I enjoy neurosurgery but also enjoy other surgical specialties and don’t want to get pigeon-holed or trapped. My PA colleague said that where I am is better-suited for someone towards the end of their career, and it scares me that I’m here at the beginning.
I was thinking a surgical fellowship may be a good place for me to hone the skills I haven’t used in an environment where it’s understood that I’m still learning. I would get experience in specialties I haven’t even thought about since PA school, and I would get formal inpatient training. I’ve interacted with PAs who did surgical fellowships and did not highly recommend it. I’m not sure if that was due to the culture of their program or a more systematic problem.
Whereas with just getting a new job, the learning curve will be steeper and more stressful. There’s more of an expectation that you need to know what you’re doing, and for good reason.
Has anyone had experience moving from a primarily outpatient role to a more inpatient role? Any thoughts, perspectives, and advice would be appreciated.