PAs are licensed by all 50 states to practice medicine in collaboration with a physician. Each state has some sort of practice plan or collaboration agreement that allows the team to outline how they will work together to care for patients. This collegial relationship promotes quality patient care fostering a team approach to health care delivery. The services provided by the PA are determined by the collaborating physician based on the knowledge, training and skills of the PA and necessarily reflects the practice style and services provided by the dermatologist. Each state requires that a PA scope of practice mirrors that of the physician. The experience and skills of the PA will increase over time and the practice plan should allow for those changes or should be updated as needed.

Physicians

The Society of Dermatology Physician Assistants (SDPA) would like to welcome you to our official website. If you are a visiting dermatologist, we sincerely hope that you will find the information you are looking for. The SDPA was created to serve the needs of PAs specializing in dermatology. We are honored to be the largest specialty PA organization. We owe this to the physicians who have given us the opportunity to share in the care of their patients. Therefore, we also desire to provide a service to dermatologists, especially those who serve as our collaborating physicians. Currently, there are over 100,000 PA graduates. There are well over 3,000 PAs specializing in dermatology and the AAD estimates that approximately 50% of dermatologists currently employ a PA. We hope you are one of them! If not, we hope you are interested in adding a PA to your practice. We are here to help you through that process. We have developed a website, www.hireadermpa.org, to provide dermatologists with information regarding the training, education and utilization of PAs. It also provides an opportunity to place a job listing for a PA and search member resumes. Dermatologists who currently supervise a PA are offered complimentary membership to the SDPA and enjoy benefits such as a subscription to our Journal of Dermatology PAs (JDPA), a physician newsletter relating to PA practice, contract & compensation information, access to a document library, and much more. Please take a moment to see for yourself what the SDPA has to offer to our physician colleagues.