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Paging Physician Assistants As Obamacare Fuels Demand

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There is unprecedented demand for physician assistants as insurance payment and the Affordable Care Act encourage a team-based approach to managing the care of patient populations.

A snapshot of this trend can be seen in a new report by The Medicus Firm, a national physician recruiter, which said physician assistants (PAs) rose to No. 5 among its top 10 most frequently placed medical care providers in 2014, outstripping several categories of medical doctors. Primary care doctors continue to hold the top three spots with family physicians at No. 1, followed by hospitalist doctors and internists at No. 3.

Just a year earlier in 2013, PAs were at No. 6 following primary care physicians, general surgeons and orthopedic surgeons. And PAs didn’t even appear in Medicus’ top 10 list of frequently placed providers in 2012.

“PAs now make up nearly 7 percent of our total placements which grew from next to nothing, in a two year period,” Medicus said in a statement to Forbes. “And most of the PAs we place are in primary care roles, too.”

A physician assistant is nationally certified and state-licensed with a two-year master’s degree, often from a program that runs about two years and includes three years of healthcare training, according to the American Academy of Physician Assistants. They work in doctor’s offices, retail clinics and other locations and their work includes diagnosing illnesses, writing prescriptions and counseling patients on preventive care.

Under the team-based approach, physician assistants are increasingly an integral part of accountable care organizations (ACOs) and other care models that contract with insurers, Medicare and Medicaid programs. The ACO shares in money that is saved from the costs of keeping a population of patients healthy. Major insurers like Aetna (AET), Cigna (CI), Humana (HUM) and UnitedHealth Group (UNH) are increasing their contracts with ACOs as insurers move away from fee-for-service medicine.

Physician assistants are so in demand they are gaining part of the signing bonus pie traditionally reserved for doctors.

Medicus said the average signing bonus more than doubled for a PA or nurse practitioner to $7,500 last year from $3,000 in 2013.

“What was once considered going ‘above and beyond’ in up-front bonuses, is now the standard practice,” Jim Stone, president of The Medicus Firm said. “Prior to 2014, the largest signing bonus offered to one of our physicians was $75,000. In 2014, the highest signing bonus was $200,000.”

Wondering how Obamacare will affect your health care? The Forbes eBook Inside Obamacare: The Fix For America’s Ailing Health Care System answers that question and more. Available now at Amazon andApple.