The PA Profession’s Next Transformation: Doctoral Education Matters
Peter Yen, DMSc, MSHA, PA-C, LSSGB
The PA profession was created to answer a pressing healthcare need. It succeeded because PAs were prepared to provide excellent care and adapt to where patients needed them most.
That same ability to adapt will determine the profession’s future. Healthcare needs more clinicians, but it also needs people who can lead teams, teach, evaluate evidence, improve care, and help organizations respond to change. Post professional doctoral education may be the most important investment PAs can make in their profession’s long-term strength because it prepares PAs to do all those things while building on their clinical foundation.
Growth alone will not secure our future
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects PA employment to grow 21% from 2025 to 2035. Employment across all occupations is projected to grow about 3% over the same period.[1] In plain terms, demand for PAs is growing much faster than demand for workers overall.
That is encouraging, but the number of PA jobs tells only part of the story. As the profession grows, someone must educate new PAs, lead expanding services, study patient outcomes, and help decide how PAs fit into changing models of care. If PAs want a strong voice in those decisions, they need preparation for those roles.
The profession already has a head start. In a national report, more than half of board-certified PAs had changed specialties at least once, and about one in six held a leadership role in their main job.[2] PAs have shown they can move into new clinical areas. Doctoral education can help more PAs take the next step: shaping the teams, programs, and systems in which they work.
History offers a lesson
Other health professions have changed their educational paths as their roles and expectations evolved. Pharmacy moved to the Doctor of Pharmacy as its sole entry-level professional degree in 2000. Physical therapy required the Doctor of Physical Therapy for graduates of accredited entry-level programs beginning in 2016. Audiology also moved to doctoral preparation for new certification applicants. [3–5]
Those professions followed their own paths for their own reasons. Their histories do not prove that a doctorate automatically expands legal authority, improves patient outcomes, or raises pay. They do show that a profession can reconsider its educational preparation when the work it expects its members to do changes.
Occupational therapy offers another useful lesson: it continues to allow entry at either the master’s or doctoral level.[6] Doctoral growth does not have to mean that every PA must earn a doctorate to enter practice. The PA profession can preserve an accessible clinical entry path while creating strong post professional doctoral paths for PAs seeking broader responsibilities.
The added skill set is the point
Consider a PA who sees the same problem every week: patients leave the hospital with a sound treatment plan but struggle to get timely follow-up care. Clinical training helps the PA recognize and manage the consequences for each patient. Doctoral study in areas such as research, quality improvement, and leadership can help that PA examine the pattern, design a better process, measure whether it works, and bring a team together to sustain it.
That is the added value. A PA can care for the patient in front of them and help improve care for the patients who come next. The expanded skill set is a professional “superpower” when it is put to work.
It can be used in clinical leadership, PA education, research, administration, and the evaluation of new technology. A doctoral-prepared PA may lead a care improvement project or teach future clinicians without leaving practice. In one study of PAs with doctoral degrees, about nine in ten worked primarily as clinicians.[7] Advanced education can deepen a PA’s contribution at the bedside as well as open doors beyond it.
The profession needs those contributions. Federal projections anticipate a shortage of more than 140,000 physicians by 2038, with particularly serious shortages outside metropolitan areas.[8] PAs alone cannot close that gap. PAs who can deliver care and help build effective care teams are, however, well positioned to help communities and health systems respond.
A stronger voice in the profession’s direction
Doctoral education also matters because PA programs need PA leaders. A five-year study of faculty hiring found that nearly half of postings for program directors and similar leadership positions preferred a doctoral credential.[9] As PA education grows, doctoral-prepared PAs can compete for these roles and bring their clinical perspective to decisions about how future PAs are trained.
Research suggests doctoral PAs are already working across clinical, educational, and leadership roles.[7] The potential is larger still. PAs trained to study care processes and communicate findings can help build the profession’s evidence base. PAs who understand both patient care and organizational decisions can make a stronger case for effective PA integration. PAs who teach can pass those skills to the next generation.
This is how doctoral education can help future-proof the profession: it gives more PAs the tools to respond when healthcare changes, and the ability to help direct that change.
The case must be earned
A degree is only as valuable as what its holder can do with it. A doctorate does not change a PA’s legal scope of practice by itself, and existing studies do not prove that earning one causes better patient outcomes or career advancement.
Doctoral programs also vary. A review of 24 PA-specific post professional programs found that most emphasized leadership, education, or clinical practice advancement, but the amount of research training differed. The authors called for clearer expectations and better evidence about graduates’ results.[10] That challenge should be taken seriously. Programs should show that graduates can lead useful projects, produce sound scholarship, improve care, and strengthen the PA workforce.
The master’s degree remains the usual entry path into PA practice.[1] Post professional doctoral education can build on that foundation. It offers PAs a way to prepare for work that demands more than clinical expertise alone.
The PA profession’s first great achievement was expanding access to capable clinical care. Its next may be developing a larger group of PAs who can care for patients, lead improvement, educate colleagues, and shape healthcare’s future. History shows that health professions can evolve their education as their responsibilities change. The labor market shows that PAs are growing rapidly. Doctoral education offers a practical way to turn that growth into lasting influence.
References
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Physician Assistants: Occupational Outlook Handbook. Employment projections, 2025–2035.
National Commission on Certification of Physician Assistants. 2024 Statistical Profile of Board Certified PAs. Published 2025.
Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education. About ACPE.
American Physical Therapy Association. The Clinical Doctorate Becomes the Only Degree Conferred by CAPTE-Accredited Educational Institutions.
American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. Professional Autonomy, Certification, and Licensure in Audiology.
Accreditation Council for Occupational Therapy Education. Student Resources.
Klein A, Kayingo G, Schrode KM, Soria K. Physician assistants/associates with doctoral degrees: Where are they now? Journal of Physician Assistant Education. 2024;35(1):14–20. doi:10.1097/JPA.0000000000000549.
Health Resources and Services Administration, Bureau of Health Workforce. Health Workforce Projections. Physician workforce projections for 2038.
Assessing demand for doctoral-prepared PA faculty: A five-year longitudinal study. BMC Medical Education. 2022. doi:10.1186/s12909-022-03375-x.
Doctoral education for physician assistants/associates: Trends and characteristics in the U.S. BMC Medical Education. 2024. doi:10.1186/s12909-024-06606-5.
The historical examples and current educational pathways are supported by the professions’ accrediting or professional organizations; the PA workforce and doctoral education findings come from the cited reports and studies. (Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education)
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