Medical School vs. PA School

Medical school and PA school both offer pathways into a career in healthcare and medicine, and many college students find themselves deciding between a career as a medical doctor and a career as a physician assistant. We cover some of the more important things to consider below:

Differences Between Medical School and PA School

General Overview

There are a number of different career paths for students interested in working in healthcare. Each of these clinical roles differ in overall education timelines, required standardized exams, and overall tuition costs. Below is a generalized education timeline comparison between some of the more common careers in healthcare that students consider.

Note that “post-graduate training” refers to everything after college undergrad (bachelor’s degree).

1. Education Timelines

The primary consideration for most incoming college students deciding between a career as a PA or doctor is total training timelines.

A career as a PA requires a minimum 6 years of school. A career in medicine as a doctor (MD) requires a minimum 8 years of school.

It should be noted that these timelines are for “traditional” pathways. Many students take alternative pathways to medical and PA school.

So these are by no means the only pathways to a career as a physician or PA. But they are the most traditional pathways. Below, we zoom in on the PA and MD timelines from the graphic above.

Again, in this chart, “post-graduate training” refers to years of education required after a 4-year college undergraduate (bachelor’s) degree.

2. Required National Exams

Another consideration when choosing between a career as a PA or doctor is the number of required national standardized exams. In addition to the lectures and exams required by your university, there are also various standardized exams that students from every program at every university in the US must pass before they can work in healthcare.

For physician assistants, these exams are the GRE (required for PA school applications) and PANCE (taken after PA school to receive certification).

For doctors, there are technically a minimum of 5 standardized exams students are required to take throughout their medical education.

The first is the MCAT (medical college admissions test), that pre-med students must take before they can apply to medical school. Then, throughout medical school and residency, the USMLE (US medical licensing exam) is broken into 3 separate exams or “steps.” USMLE Step 1 is taken after the second year of medical school, USMLE Step 2 is taken after the third year of medical school, and USMLE Step 3 is taken after the first year of residency. Students must then take the board certification exam in their specialty of choice following residency training.

3. Salaries and Career Outlooks

Another important consideration is salary differences. It is difficult to find a true “average” salary for healthcare workers because pay varies significantly between departments and specialties. Pay also varies by region. It is likely that a PA working in a private plastic surgery practice in Orange County, California, may make more than a family practice physician in rural Kansas. 

But while pay can vary greatly within both physicians and PAs depending on a variety of factors, doctors do generally have higher salaries.

It is worth considering, however, that medical doctors also have significantly more debt. The average medical student graduates with over $200,000 in student loan debt, nearly twice as much debt as the average PA student.

PA students can also begin their career immediately upon graduation. Graduating medical students must complete at least 3 years of residency training before they can begin receiving full salary.

Final Thoughts

Medical school and PA school are very different pathways. And ultimately, pay, vacation time, and educational requirements will also vary by specialty or department.

For pre-meds interested in exploring medical specialty options, read more here.