“Never stop learning”. My interest in science developed into an interest in medicine. It was through my trials of learning and my own discovery that I realized I wanted to serve my community by becoming a physician assistant.
I found a developing passion to serve and connect with my community as a member of a healthcare team in high school while obtaining my nursing assistant certification. However, in my freshman year of college, I won a one-week trip and was sponsored to play in an online tournament which lead to dedicating the early half of my college career to becoming a professional gamer. For a brief moment, I thought this was something I wanted to do. However, as I sat and thought about my life choices and my future, I knew that I still wanted to be in healthcare and rekindled my passion from high school to pursue medicine.
I knew that working in healthcare, I needed to change. After taking a semester off, I made my classes a priority and in the following semesters, I realized that the effort and time I dedicated to classes would reflect in my grades. It was not a complete download in the beginning but Organic Chemistry was the first subject that I invested my time in that made me realize that I am a step closer to my future goals. The classes that I took and have retaken in the last two and a half years of my college career reflects on my higher-level involvement in making school a priority with improved grades.
During the last couple of years of my college career, I was involved with undergraduate research with Dr. Andrew Andres from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. I was grateful that he included me in his research with salivary glands of Drosophila melanogaster and even more when he approved of my own research project for fat bodies. We would have group discussions every week discussing our own research and collaborated with each other to make suggestions or improvements for various tasks/approaches for different studies. I enjoyed the information that was presented to me as well as the data I was able to collect and present. Even though I was learning a great deal of knowledge, besides the group of scholars I was working with, I wasn’t very much involved with my community.
After college, I started working as an emergency scribe and had my first experience understanding the role physician assistants play in the healthcare team. I realized that they provide care similar to the doctors of the same department. Clarke, a physician assistant I scribed for, had his own practice and collaborated with the attending physician when treating his patients. The attending physician would occasionally ask for Clarke’s input regarding various treatments ranging from simple urinary tract infections to complicated metabolic diseases. Maintaining autonomy while being part of a team was exactly what I was looking for in a career.
Laura, another physician assistant, told me stories of her family and how she was able to simultaneously support her children while also dedicating time to her patients. My mother has six siblings while my father has seven. The family gatherings were always large, especially when it was someone’s birthday.  And it was always someone’s birthday.  Family is important to me and speaking with Laura helped me realize that I can start a family and be part of family gatherings without sacrificing work.
Part of my goal after I become a physician assistant is to be involved in outreach. My family has moved more times than I have fingers throughout the valley ever since arriving in America at the age of 9. I am familiar with the different communities in Las Vegas and I would like to make physician assistants more known. It wasn’t until I did my own research and discovery that I realized being a physician assistant is the best fit for me.
I believe that the best way to learn is by experiencing it myself. I can learn a great deal of knowledge while having a positive impact on different communities by being able to switch specialties.
“Never stop learning” is a phrase I keep to heart. I will continue to make my goal of becoming a physician assistant so I can better serve my community a priority.