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Former AAPA-PAEA Research Fellow Discusses Successful Application and Importance of Research

By: Adrian Banning, DHSc, MMS, PA-C 

Adrian Banning
Dr. Adrian Banning, 2020-2021 AAPA-PAEA Research Fellow

The Fellowship was not what I expected. It was so much more! Innovation and progress start with curiosity and are fueled with knowledge acquisition, hopefully translating into wisdom and even policy change. For the profession to flourish, we need more experienced PA researchers who can ask essential questions and generate meaningful data to inform how we teach and advocate for ourselves. Each PA researcher can make a lasting contribution. We can and should hold all the roles that our physician and nursing colleagues weave into their identities: leader, academic, researcher, advocate, legal consultant, director, and benefactor. There is more than one way to be a PA.  

As a PA faculty member interested in gaining more research and scholarship training and experience, I had been aware of the opportunity to apply to the Fellowship for many years. I thought only doctoral students or people with a doctorate could apply, but in 2018, I learned too late that enrollment in a doctoral program is not required. I rushed that application, and it was not my best work (see point #2 below). While a doctorate is not required, my experience in my research-heavy Doctor of Health Sciences (DHSc) training, which I completed in 2020, was beneficial to my 2020 application and subsequent project.  

If you are interested in applying, here are a few other things you should know: 

  • Being an AAPA-PAEA Research Fellow is worth more than you know. Fellows connect with a world of rich resources and network with leaders and researchers at PAEA and AAPA as well as with previous fellows, leaders in PA research, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Association of American Medical Colleges, the National Center for Education Statistics, the Robert Graham Center, the National Academy of Medicine, and many other organizations. I have a better understanding of the data that PAEA and AAPA collect and a refined sense of the support that both organizations’ research teams can offer.  
  • Being an AAPA-PAEA Research Fellow is worth more than you know. Fellows connect with a world of rich resources and network with leaders and researchers at PAEA and AAPA as well as with previous fellows, leaders in PA research, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Association of American Medical Colleges, the National Center for Education Statistics, the Robert Graham Center, the National Academy of Medicine, and many other organizations. I have a better understanding of the data that PAEA and AAPA collect and a refined sense of the support that both organizations’ research teams can offer.  
  • Being an AAPA-PAEA Research Fellow is worth more than you know. Fellows connect with a world of rich resources and network with leaders and researchers at PAEA and AAPA as well as with previous fellows, leaders in PA research, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Association of American Medical Colleges, the National Center for Education Statistics, the Robert Graham Center, the National Academy of Medicine, and many other organizations. I have a better understanding of the data that PAEA and AAPA collect and a refined sense of the support that both organizations’ research teams can offer.  
  • Being an AAPA-PAEA Research Fellow is worth more than you know. Fellows connect with a world of rich resources and network with leaders and researchers at PAEA and AAPA as well as with previous fellows, leaders in PA research, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Association of American Medical Colleges, the National Center for Education Statistics, the Robert Graham Center, the National Academy of Medicine, and many other organizations. I have a better understanding of the data that PAEA and AAPA collect and a refined sense of the support that both organizations’ research teams can offer.  
  • Being an AAPA-PAEA Research Fellow is worth more than you know. Fellows connect with a world of rich resources and network with leaders and researchers at PAEA and AAPA as well as with previous fellows, leaders in PA research, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Association of American Medical Colleges, the National Center for Education Statistics, the Robert Graham Center, the National Academy of Medicine, and many other organizations. I have a better understanding of the data that PAEA and AAPA collect and a refined sense of the support that both organizations’ research teams can offer.  

My project, Correlations Between PA Student Well-being and PA Program Well-being Curricula, is a secondary analysis of existing, deidentified PAEA survey data. Physician Assistant (PA) and PA student well-being have been increasingly recognized as a priority. Accordingly, the latest edition of Accreditation Standards for Physician Assistant Education (ARC-PA) requires PA programs to include instruction on provider wellness, including preventing impairment and burnout (Standard B2.20).1 The new standard is in line with the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine recommendation that medical training programs take steps to employ programming to support learner professional well-being.2 However, the most effective methods for preventing burnout and promoting well-being in PAs and PA students are currently unknown. The research I pursued during my time as a Fellow addresses this gap by analyzing data to determine if attendance in a PA program that reports teaching provider health and well-being influences students’ self-reported well-being.  

Research Questions 

  • Are there correlations between dependent variables of PA student self-reported well-being at the beginning or end of their training related to the independent variables of the PA program that the student attends, hours of well-being instruction by their PA program, or type of well-being instruction by their PA program?  
  • Are there correlations between dependent variables of PA student self-reported well-being at the beginning or end of their training related to the independent variables of the PA program that the student attends, hours of well-being instruction by their PA program, or type of well-being instruction by their PA program?  

I hope that my study results will improve understanding of PA students’ well-being and stress across several different student demographics (e.g., matriculant and graduate status, racial, gender, and sexual identity), the extent to which existing curricula are effective at supporting student well-being, and if student well-being education (versus provider-centered) curricula might be warranted. I expect to submit several presentations and publications from this work and feel this will positively influence my research career. The Fellowship has already afforded me more growth, inspiration, support, and connections than I could have imagined, and I am grateful for that.   

If you are interested in applying for the Fellowship, the deadline is 11:59 p.m. ET on Sunday, June 5. Applications must be submitted through the PAEA Research online application platform. For more information about eligibility, applicant evaluation criteria, and application requirements, please download the 2022-2023 AAPA-PAEA Research Fellowship Submission Guidelines or contact us at Research@PAEAonline.org or 703-651-8540.  

1Accreditation Review Commission on Education for the Physician Assistant, Inc. Accreditation Standards for Physician Assistant Education, Fifth Edition. ARC-PA; 2019. 

2National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. Taking Action Against Clinician Burnout: A Systems Approach to Professional Well-Being. Washington DC: The National Academies Press; 2019.