Alabama health committee hears how physician assistants could expand access amid regulatory hurdles

On Jan. 14, 2006, the Alabama House Health Committee heard from Heather Neighbors, legislative committee chair of the Alabama Society of Physician Assistants, about PA education, certification and regulatory obstacles that she said constrain PAs from helping to address primary care shortages in the state.

Neighbors told the committee that PAs receive graduate-level, medical-model training and that the profession was founded in 1965 by Dr. Eugene Stead at Duke. "PA education is medical model based. It is nationally standardized and designed to prepare graduates to deliver safe, high quality, cost effective care across all specialties and settings," she said. She noted the University of Alabama at Birmingham's PA program, founded in 1967, is one of the earliest programs and that Alabama now has four PA programs.

Neighbors described certification and maintenance requirements: graduates…