The Physician Assistant Student’s Guide to the Clinical Year: Pediatrics

Tanya Fernandez, MS, PA-C, IBCLC has been a PA for 14 years, focusing on clinical work in underserved populations. She started her career in full-spectrum family practice and transitioned to pediatric and adolescent medicine as her patients began to grow their families. With an interest in promoting child and maternal health, she augmented her clinical skills by becoming an international board certified lactation consultant in 2014. She started teaching physician assistant students in the clinical setting in 2006 and has been educating students ever since. She joined the faculty at her alma mater, the University of Colorado Child Health Associate/Physician Assistant (CHA/PA) Program, in 2016 and serves as the Clinical Education Director, liaison to the Urban Underserved Health Track and Assistant Professor in the Department of Pediatrics. As the only PA program in the nation with an increased emphasis on pediatrics, the CHA/PA Program provides students with extended didactic and clinical experiences in specialty, hospital and ambulatory pediatrics. In addition to curating the Stages of Life/Patients & Populations longitudinal didactic curriculum, Tanya oversees the 3-year clinical education curriculum. Because of this role, she has a keen interest in students' self-directed learning while in the clinical curriculum. Amy Akerman, MPAS, PA-C has been a PA for 17 years, most of that time spent in primary care practice. She began her career working in Kodiak, Alaska and then spent over three years in a GP practice in Weston-super-Mare, England as part of the National Health Service. She enjoyed helping to introduce the PA profession to the United Kingdom and still enjoys talking to patients and students about all the great things PA's can do. Amy joined the University of Colorado Child Health Associate/Physician Assistant (CHA/PA) Program in 2016 as the academic coordinator, global health track advisor and serves as an Assistant Director of the University of Colorado Interprofessional Education Council. Nationally, Amy serves on the PAEA Government Relations Steering Committee. She enjoys talking with students about global health topics and professional and patient advocacy. Maureen Knechtel, MPAS, PA-C, received a bachelor's degree in health science and a master's degree in physician assistant studies from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, PA. She is the author of the textbook EKGs for the Nurse Practitioner and Physician Assistant, 1st and 2nd editions. Knechtel is a fellow member of the Physician Assistant Education Association, the American Academy of Physician Assistants, and the Tennessee Academy of Physician Assistants. She is the academic coordinator and an assistant professor with the Milligan College Physician Assistant Program in Johnson City, TN, and practices as a cardiology PA with the Ballad Health Cardiovascular Associates Heart Institute. Knechtel has been a guest lecturer nationally and locally on topics including EKG interpretation, chronic angina, ischemic and hemorrhagic stroke, hypertension, and mixed hyperlipidemia.