 If you're looking for a video on a specific topic, simply type in what you're looking for in my channel's search bar, and if I have videos addressing that topic, it will take you right to them. Enjoy! What's up you guys? It's Adana. Welcome back to another Q&A Tuesday! Thank you guys so much for joining me on this journey and coming to my channel to see what this is all about. If you don't know what Q&A Tuesdays is all about, well actually it's PA Q&A Tuesday, so you can ask your PA related questions in the comment section below. Just leave that there. And if you haven't already done so, go ahead and subscribe to my channel! Alright, so let's get into it. Excited about these Q&A's, exclamation mark. My question for next time, how and where in the CASMA application should withdrawals be explained? Do they always look bad to admissions committees, especially if they are not prerequisite courses? Thanks Adana. So, how and where should your withdrawals be explained? So, it's not really like a designated place per say in the CASMA application. There are, as the specific schools will have secondary questions or application essay questions where they give you the opportunity to explain that, but not all schools do. With respect to CASMA, no, there's not truly a designated spot. However, if they do give you the opportunity to explain any like laps in your schooling or any dips in maybe your GPA, you can explain it there on that designated section. For me, I don't know if it really looks bad to admissions committees, especially if it's not related to one of your prerequisite courses. I think that's something that you should just go ahead and ask the committee's admissions directors at the schools that you're trying to apply to directly because they'll be better able to answer that. But I don't think that it would look bad. I mean, I don't know if schools even look at your entire transcript like that. I think they more so look at your prerequisite courses, what courses you deemed as prerequisites to meet those requirements, and then any additional science courses for your science GPA. But I don't, I mean, I don't know. So, the best thing to do when you don't know is just go ahead and ask the school directly. That's what I did with any questions that I had and anything CASPA related. I kind of like just bug CASPA and I call them all the time. They were like my friends. So, if you have any questions about CASPA and that application process specifically, go ahead and call them. They're usually really helpful with answering those questions. Since PAs don't have to do a residency in the field they want to specialize in, does that mean they get on the job training? What are the advantages of doing a residency? So, with respect to that, yes, you don't necessarily have to do a residency, but there are a lot of PAs that do do residencies. And then now that more doctoral programs are starting to pop up doing a fellowship or a residency is kind of becoming like a thing. And there's probably going to be like a drive towards that in the future. But yes, we get on the job training and not just on the job training, but in rotations when you're going through trying to figure out, hey, do I want to be an ERPA or a surgical PA or a family practice PA? That's what that rotation is for. We're doing a lot of it in school as it is. And then when we're on rotations, we get a lot of training, shadowing, we're able to like practice a lot of our suturing, that kind of thing. And then when we apply for jobs, there's going to be an extensive training period where you're getting, you're on the job training, and then you're kind of just like sit off to off to work. So that's usually how that whole process happens. As far as advantages of residencies go, I mean, I just feel like you're just more marketable. You're just a better fit for whatever particular residency you did. If you did a surgical residency, I think that that would look a whole lot better than somebody who's coming straight out of PA school, just maybe doing two surgical rotations. You've had extensive training in this. You've spent months just in and out of surgery rooms and, you know, performing or first assisting on surgeries. So I feel like it just makes you a more marketable, marketable PA. And it's only going to be better for you and beneficial for you in the future. Do you have to become a CNA or MA prior to applying to PA school? So not necessarily. You don't need to be a CNA or an MA before applying to PA school. You can be an EMT. You could be a farm tech. You can be an ortho tech, can be a surgical tech. It's really a matter of getting health care experience or patient care experience. There are two different things. Health care experience is anything in the health care field. So even if you're like answering the phones at a physician's office, that is health care experience during the health care field. But when schools specify and say you need to have direct patient care experience, that is specific to you directing the care for that particular patient. I know CASPA breaks it down a lot easier or they try to do a really good job of explaining what patient care experience is in their frequently asked questions section. But that is one of the things that they state. So there are some positions as an MA or a CNA where you're not necessarily directing the care of your patient per CASPA. However, there are other positions that are. So you just have to be very specific in what your role as a CNA or an MA was to show that you were actually day in, day out like you're seeing patients, you're taking blood pressure, you're doing all of these different things. But no, you don't need to be a CNA or an MA specifically. You can do anything that you'd like just as long as it is getting health care experience and patient care experience. I want to go to PA school. I need one more LOR. Do you know where I can get that? Okay. So yeah, I don't know exactly where you can get one more letter of recommendation because it has to be specific to you. So if you already have one from your PA or your MD, which I definitely suggest that you have one from a PA. If you're applying a PA school, most schools require one from a PA, but some schools will allow you to have one from an NPA or an MD as well or a DL, then go ahead and get one from one of your professors. The professors that I did really, really well in their class in, they already knew that I wanted to be in PA school and I had them as options like backup options if my first choice for my letter of recommendation did not come through. So I would suggest if you're still in school or if you just recently graduated from school to reach out to one of your professors that knows you particularly as a student so that they can get that letter of recommendation from you and then also just make sure that it's clear to them that hey, you know, guys, like it's just an email. They're going to send you a link and you just have to follow that link and it's not really a matter of like you have to do a whole bunch of stuff and mail something off. It's all electronic and that really is my best suggestion. If you don't know where to get another letter of recommendation, just kind of think, think about who you know, ask around, maybe you know a nurse, maybe you know a PA and you don't even realize it and try to get it that way. All right, so that was it. That was our next PA Q&A Tuesday. I love doing these for you guys. Please, please, please leave your questions and comments in the comments section below. If you have any questions that you want me to answer on the next P&A Q&A Tuesday, it's such a tongue twister. Leave your comments and your questions in the comments section below. If you haven't already done so, go ahead and follow me on Instagram at adanathepa and subscribe to my channel right now. Thank you guys so much for watching and I will talk to you guys next time. Bye.