You will not have time to read for fun in PA school. Do it now.

I'm sharing the books I think every pre-PA should get through before they start, and they're not textbooks. They're the ones that change how you think about medicine and about patients.

Atul Gawande shows up more than once on this list. Complications and Better are both worth your time, because he's honest about uncertainty and failure in a way most of medicine isn't. That's the stuff nobody teaches you.

I also included fiction. Still Alice will wreck you a little, and that's the point - it puts you inside a patient's experience and inside a family watching it happen. You cannot learn that from a lecture.

One more reason to read these: they give you something real to talk about in interviews. "What have you read recently?" is a question that trips people up constantly.

What I cover:

• The books I'd hand every pre-PA before day one
• Why Gawande belongs on your shelf
• What fiction teaches you about the patient side
• Ethical dilemmas you'll face and how these books prepare you
• Using what you've read in an interview answer
• Building a reading habit before school eats your calendar

Resources:

PA School Interview Guide: https://www.thepaplatform.com/physician-assistant-school-interview-guide

Free PA School Application Timeline: https://www.thepaplatform.com/services/free-application-timeline

PA Program Map: https://www.thepaplatform.com/pa-platform-map

Pre-PA Counseling: https://www.thepaplatform.com/services/pre-pa-counseling

Mentioned in this episode:

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If you've followed my account for a while, you know how much I love to read.

And so today I wanted to share some of my favorite books that I think all pre PAs should read before starting PA school, or if you're already in school or just if you like books.

Welcome to the Pre PA Club Podcast.

If you want to learn how to become a physician assistant, you're in the right place.

I'm your host, Savannah Perry.

Let's get to it.

Hey guys, thanks for joining me on today's episode of the Pre PA Club Podcast.

I'm your host, Savannah Perry.

I am a dermatology PA and I run the website called the PA Platform, which helps aspiring and future PAs figure out what they need to do.

We know this is a complicated process, so we try to make it easy.

Ooh, that's an understatement or an overstatement.

We just try to help you.

It's a frustrating process.

I know right now everyone is in the middle of interviews, are waiting to hear back, or in that application season where they really just aren't sure what's going on.

And if you feel nervous, if you feel anxious, if you feel stressed, just know that is completely normal and you are not alone.

There are many others in the Pre PA Club, on Facebook, in my messages, in my emails who feel exactly the same way.

And I have also been in your shoes.

Was over 10 years ago now and I remember how that feels.

So hang in there.

If there's anything we can do to help you out, please let me know.

You can find us all over the Internet on TikTok.

We're at physician assistant, on Instagram, at the PA platform and on YouTube.

We are also the PA platform, so lots of things out there to help you.

The website has tons of blog posts, of course there are tons of podcast episodes and we are just here to help.

I do want to mention one of our sponsors that you're about to hear about.

I have officially been a PA for eight years and that means I have to start the process of studying for my Panry, which is our recertification exam.

I'll be using one of our podcast.

Sponsors, Picmonic, an audio visual learning system with unforgettable stories and characters to revisit everything I learned in PA school.

The subjects in Picmonic are based on the pants and pantry and a great memory tool and supplement to help make the information stick.

I'm working on cardiology today and the.

Videos are short and digestible, which fits in perfectly with a busy schedule.

There's a free option that offers a free daily picmonic.

Or you can sign up now for access on iOS, Android or desktop and get 20% off with the link in.

The description or use the code thepaplatform at checkout and and that will also get you that discount.

I've been doing a couple videos a day and it is super helpful.

So today we're talking about books I love to read.

I've been part of a monthly book club for the past I don't even know, probably six years now.

We've read a ton of books.

I love listening to audiobooks, reading on my Kindle, reading an actual book.

It's just something I love to do.

So I feel like throughout all the books I've read, I try to read a variety of different genres and types of authors.

And I've come across some books that I think are very helpful for people who want to work in medicine or want to be PAs, and I wanted to share those with you today.

Maybe you've read some of these, maybe you've heard of some of them, but a lot of these books may even help you with your interview prep or getting ready for school because they're going to give you a different perspective and help you understand medicine in different ways.

Some of them are fiction, some are nonfiction, but here are some books that I have enjoyed that I think you might as well.

Some of these books, by the way, are on Audible and Audible is where I listen to a lot of audiobooks right now.

They have a promotion where if you sign up for a free trial and you get two free audiobooks, that is a great deal and so highly recommend you take advantage of that.

The link to that deal is in the description of this episode and make sure you cancel if you don't want to keep getting audiobook credits.

Or maybe you'll fall in love with me.

Oh, that's not what I meant to say.

Maybe you'll fall in love with audiobooks like me and want to listen 24 7.

And if you do, check out your library.

The libraries, at least here in Georgia, have some really great apps.

One is called Libby and one is called Hoopla that have Kindle books and ebooks that you can download and read for free.

Borrowing, like from a library.

They also have audiobooks you can borrow.

So that is a great way and a free resource to find a lot of great books.

Okay, before we jump in, I have to mention my books that I wrote, of course.

So if you're still prepa and you need help with your process.

I can't say these will be absolutely the most exciting books you've ever read, but they might be some of the most helpful.

So we have the PA School Personal.

Statement Guide and the PA School Interview Guide.

Both of these have just all of my advice rolled into one.

So if you don't want to search the Internet for everything and take a lot of time trying to figure out where stuff is, it's all in these books.

They are available on Amazon so you can order, use your prime shipping and get those really quickly.

And if you have any questions about them, please let me know.

But we I like to think that these have helped a lot of people.

There are good reviews on Amazon and if you have used the books and enjoyed them, I would so appreciate a review on Amazon that helps other people to find the books and helps more future PAs so getting into our books, our medical books, the first one I have to share and I talk about this a lot on social media or whenever anyone asks me what book they should read.

Sometimes interviewers will ask you what's the last book you read?

Or something along those lines, which if you're not a reader that's okay.

But if you are scared of that question and maybe you want to have something to answer, maybe some of these will be helpful to you.

But my number one go to that I recommend for everyone is the books written by Dr. Atul Gawande.

I wish he would write more books because he is so talented as a writer.

But his first book is called Complications and this book, it's a really great it's nonfiction, but it's a great combination of personal stories and his insights and perspectives as a physician.

And he talks about just the issues with our medical system and with medicine and working in medicine, a lot of ethical stuff and ones that he doesn't even necessarily have a solution to.

And so it's a great book to make you think.

And if you're going to be in medicine thinking about who you want to provide your care and you're going to be a PA providing care and how people might view that he doesn't I don't recall talk about PAs specifically in there, or at least not in a negative way, which is good.

But there are talking about your family members and the care they receive and how we care for patients in death and hospice and palliative care situations.

There's just so many great things.

I probably am due for a reread of it because it is just that good.

I did recommend this book for book club one Time and a lot of the people in our book club who are non medical said they felt like it was too gory and could not get through it.

I disagree.

I don't think it was gory at all.

But I also assume if you're listening to this podcast that you have some interest in medicine, so you could probably handle it.

He talked about surgery and things like that.

So then he takes those concepts from complications.

And Dr. Galandi wrote a second book called Better.

And in Better he proposes some solutions to some of the issues talked about in Complications, some things that he's researched.

I appreciate that these books are focused on evidence based medicine and really provide good insight that is well researched, which as someone in medicine I just appreciate.

So Better is the follow up to Complications.

I highly recommend both of them if you're going to do the audible trial.

Like those should be your two that you get.

And I think that will give you really great perspectives for rotations and interviews and some of the situations that you'll see throughout your career in medicine.

Building off of Better There are two books that kind of came out of that that are somewhat addressed in better and then Dr. Gwande expanded on them.

These aren't quite as medically based, but I think they are both still really great concepts.

One is called the Checklist Manifesto, and that's the idea that if we become very good at one thing and if we have these checklists in place and these algorithms, it leads to less mistakes, which in medicine, clearly we don't want to make mistakes.

So he references some really amazing surgery centers and the way that they function to just have really high efficiency and quality of care.

Really great concepts that I think after I read it, started seeing ways that we could implement things like this in practice, even in a smaller private practice dermatology setting.

And then the other one is called Being Mortal, which in our culture and the American kind of way of things, we don't necessarily like to talk about death very much, but it is an important text topic.

And Being Mortal focuses on how different cultures approach death and things like hospice and really honoring someone through the process of dying.

It sounds morbid, but it is a great book that really makes you think because you will have patients who, whether they're your patient or not, are potentially going to pass away while they're under your care.

Even working in dermatology, while most of the time our patients are fine, we do have melanoma patients who end up very sick and pass away.

Or a few weeks ago I had a patient who I was seeing for just her normal checkup, but she recently found out she has metastatic breast cancer and they're not sure if they're going to be able to do anything.

And being able to talk to patients about that type of thing and about their decisions and walking with them through that process is part of working in medicine and something you absolutely will experience.

And it's not easy.

So having these outside thoughts and perspectives can be helpful.

So those are Dr. Gwande's books.

I could probably talk about them a lot longer if I could figure out how to do a virtual book club about them, I totally would.

I just don't know how to do that.

But highly recommend, so those are really good ones.

Okay.

Another book, and I will be upfront and honest, this one has come highly recommended and I started it and did not finish it and I'll tell you why.

So another book that I hear very often in the medical setting is When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi.

I don't know if I'm saying that right.

And Dr. Kalanithi was a neurosurgeon who found out that he had cancer.

And as he was going through the process of treatment and questions about mortality, he wrote this book.

It is beautifully written.

I read the first couple chapters.

To be perfectly honest, it hit way too close for home to me.

My husband's a physician and my dad had cancer and at the time I just couldn't get through it.

I was crying, too hard to read.

So I put that book aside.

At some point I may try to pick it back up again, but it did feel a little heavy for me at the time.

But I think even from what I read and got from it, the messages in it and the perspective is a very good one.

Two Just a A little warning there something.

Whenever I talk about books on Instagram that I love and medical books, this one always comes up.

So I did want to recommend it.

I wanted to talk about a few fiction books that have medical settings or medical storylines that I think can be a little more fun to read but still teach you something.

So one of those books is one called Still Alice by Lisa Genova.

And this book is about someone who gets early onset Alzheimer's and how that affects her family and what that process looks like of going through this diagnosis and learning about it.

And it was a little heavy, a little sad, but not quite as sad as I expected.

A very good read though.

I want to say this even got made into a movie, but I'm not 100% sure.

Maybe I made that up, but I do think there was a movie made from it too.

But Alzheimer's can be such a sad, devastating disease.

But again, you will see patients with Alzheimer's and dementia and that can make a patient and a person just act very differently than their normal.

And it can be very frustrating to them as they are trying to navigate these changes with their brain, really.

So I think from understanding a patient's family in these settings, this book gives you really great perspectives all around that you can take with you into practice.

So that was still Alice and we will link all of these in the description so that you can find them and we'll post them on social media also.

So that was still Alice by Lisa Genova and the other one I wanted to mention and this one seems a little, this one's out of left field, but it's fine.

So in book club we read something called the Silent Patient, which you would probably think would be like very medical.

It's not.

It's just like a crazy thriller.

There are some scenes that are taking place in like a mental hospital, a psychiatric institution, but I would not say it is particularly a medical book.

So that was the Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides.

I'm probably saying that one wrong too.

But again, interesting if you like a thriller.

It was very popular for a while at least a couple years ago, has great ratings.

So give it a shot.

Another book I wanted to mention strictly because they mentioned PAS in the book, which I think is so cool, is the Cheat Sheet by Sarah Adams.

It is such a cute like rom com type book, very quick read, very fun, like will make you laugh alone in your car if you are listening to it.

But I they she mentions PAs and specifically talks about basically a girl going on a date with a physician assistant and I just love that.

So we got a shout out in her book which I thought was cool.

And then if you I have a blog post on books on my website that I probably need to update.

But on that list I think something that I will be reading next is called the House of God by Samuel Shem and I've heard this is a very funny quick read that is satirical about working in medicine and hospital settings.

It's been on my list for a while.

I don't know why I haven't read it yet, but that I think will be what I read next if you want to join me.

I think that was written a while ago, so I'm not sure how up to date the information is or even what to expect.

So that is a list of books should give you some ideas of maybe some that you want to add to your list.

Put on your birthday or Christmas wish list.

Or if you're looking for something to prepare for interviews, those may be helpful for you.

And if you have any suggestions, please follow us on social media.

Add your suggestions, comment with it so that we can find more awesome books to add to our list.

All right guys, I'll see you next week.

Sa.