In February of 1971, Dr. Arthur Hutson joined the faculty of MUSC’s Family Medicine department as an assistant professor.  Shortly thereafter, he was asked to start and direct a physician assistant program to meet the need for primary care practitioners at the time. With the help of many willing supporters, Dr. Hutson received a $3 million federal grant and established the first physician assistant certification program in South Carolina in 1973.

The original PA program was established in MUSC’s College of Medicine. It was modeled after the MEDEX program in Seattle, Washington, designed to give post-war corpsmen a continuation of their healthcare occupation. Early on, physicians were directly involved in choosing an individual corpsman from selected applicants to join the program. They interviewed the candidates and chose the one specific student they wanted to join the class. This student, after selection, would go through the program and afterwards go to work with the physician that selected them. The time in school lasted one year: three months were dedicated to didactics then nine months to preceptorship. After many years, the program moved to the College of Allied Health Sciences, where Dr. Hutson stepped aside and turned direction over to Dr. Margaret Davies. The preceptorship was dissolved in the early 1980s and soon thereafter the grant ran out. The dean of the college did not want to support a one-year certification program and federal funding eventually ceased. The program was suspended indefinitely.

In the early 1990s, Dr. Hutson and other supporters created a demand for physician assistants in lieu of the shortage of physicians. Dr. John Johnson, Dean of the College of Health Professions and Dr. Valerie West, Assistant Dean of the College of Health Professions worked to re-establish the program by obtaining state and federal funding. This new vision for PAs brought a two-year program to the university that soon extended to 27 months. Dr. Laura Capozzi was hired as the new program director in 1994 and selected and hired the rest of the faculty, consisting of D.G. Askins, Jr., M.D. as Medical Director, Christopher Stephanoff, PA-C as Academic Coordinator, and Arnold E. Metz, Jr., PA-C as Clinical Coordinator. A class of 22 students was accepted and began their PA education in August of 1994. The program received initial accreditation during this new class’s tenure in 1995.

Dr. Capozzi remained as Program Director until late 1995 when she left the university. Dr. Askins was appointed Interim Program Director, a position he held for about six months until he was named Chair of the Department of Clinical Services and Mr. Metz was then named director. In June of 1998, the South Carolina Commission of Higher Education approved the program as a master’s level program.  The first master’s students were admitted in May of 1999. Since then, Dr. Paul Jacques (2003), Dr. Askins (2006), and Dr. Reamer Bushardt (2006-present) have served as program directors. The MUSC PA family has grown into a program that trains 70 students per year. The College of Health Professions building has become the cornerstone center in shaping future physician assistants that will continue to impact the healthcare world.

For more information about the PA profession, visit the Physician Assistant History Center.