E&H Health Sciences campus holds White Coat Ceremony for Class of 2023 Physician Assistant students
The ceremony welcomed 32 students to the Class of 2023 as they began their path towards completing the graduate program.
Dean of the School of Health Sciences, Dr. Lou Fincher and program director Christy McGhee and the program faculty welcomed the graduate students and explained the meaning behind the white coat ceremony. The ceremony concluded with students and faculty reciting the Physicians Assistant (PA) Professional Oath.
“This white coat symbolizes the transition to a scientific approach to medicine, a commitment to our patients, a commitment to each other as colleagues, a commitment to your faculty, staff, advisors and mentors, a commitment to your families, to your communities, but most of all to yourselves,” said Professor McGhee in an address to the students.
Clinical activities are embedded throughout the entirety of the 27-month program, with students beginning clinical experiences in their very first week of training at the Mel Leaman Free Clinic at Emory & Henry College School of Health Sciences, located on the Marion Campus. Students will attend the program year-round for 27 months and earn a master’s degree. Physician Assistants are advanced practice medical professionals who practice in every primary and specialty care area in a collaborative relationship with physicians and other health-care team members.
The Physician Assistant Studies program’s curriculum features evidence-based teaching and evaluation methods with emphasis on case-based and experiential learning, incorporating active learning strategies including case-based and team-based learning. Students are from our region as well as around the country, including Maryland, North Carolina, Virginia, Wisconsin, Illinois, Texas, Florida, New York, California, Ohio, Connecticut, Colorado, New Jersey and Indiana. Eighty-six students have graduated from the program, working all around the country.
The program, housed in the state-of-the-art facilities on the Marion campus, utilizes a 22 bay clinical skills lab and classroom, a simulation suite with both standardized patient examination rooms and high-fidelity simulation mannequin hospital rooms. Students also have access to a dedicated state-of-the-art cadaver lab. The program is fully accredited by the Accreditation Review Commission on Education for the Physician Assistant (ARC-PA) and the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS).
- PA Class of 2023
This white coat symbolizes the transition to a scientific approach to medicine, a commitment to our patients, a commitment to each other as colleagues, a commitment to your faculty, staff, advisors and mentors, a commitment to your families, to your communities, but most of all to yourselves.
- Professor McGhee