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So You Think Job Security Exists? A Locums PA Says, "Hold My Severance." | Fedna Morency, PA-C

• Ashley Love • Season 1 • Episode 46

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What if losing your “secure” job became the moment you claimed real freedom? That’s the turning point we explore with PA Fedna Morensi as she traces a winding path from athletic training and dance dreams to orthopedic surgery and a locum lifestyle that funds her time, not her burnout. We dig into the human side of medicine—identity, resilience, and service—while getting specific about the business decisions schools rarely teach.

Fedna breaks down the mechanics of travel PA work: licensing and credentialing timelines, navigating recruiters, spotting restrictive clauses, and balancing higher pay with responsibility. We compare W‑2 stability to 1099 flexibility in plain language, then go a layer deeper on forming an S‑corp, structuring benefits, and turning gross pay into lasting wealth. The conversation balances numbers with meaning: how rural communities gain access when a clinician shows up, how diverse teams sharpen your clinical toolbox, and why six to nine months of focused work can create the space for rest, learning, and life.

You’ll hear candid stories from multi‑specialty ortho, lessons from contracts that didn’t pan out, and a practical framework for evaluating offers—pay, schedule, call, autonomy, and culture. We talk interview strategy (career is part of you, not all of you), the myth of job security versus the reality of skill security, and a mindset shift that treats financial literacy as patient care insurance. For resources, Fedna shares her site with free guides, a growing “Travel PA Your Way to Wealth” community, and social handles to keep the conversation going.

If you’re a pre‑health student mapping your route or a clinician ready to redesign your work, this is your field guide to locums, contracts, and buying back time with intention. Subscribe, share with a friend who needs this playbook, and leave a review telling us the first freedom you’d buy with better career design.

Follow Fedna on instagram and LinkedIn or check out her website! 

Virtual shadowing is an important tool to use when planning your medical career. At Shadow Me Next! we want to provide you with the resources you need to find your role in healthcare and secure your place in medicine.

Check out our pre-health resources. Great for pre-med, pre-PA, pre-nursing, pre-therapy students or anyone else with an upcoming interview!
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Ashley:

Hello and welcome to Shadow Me Next, a podcast where I take you into and behind the scenes of the medical world to provide you with a deeper understanding of the human side of medicine. I'm Ashley, a physician assistant, medical editor, clinical preceptor, and the creator of Shadow Me Next. It is my pleasure to introduce you to incredible members of the healthcare field and uncover their unique stories, the joys and challenges they face, and what drives them in their careers. It's access you want and stories you need. Whether you're a pre-health student or simply curious about the healthcare field, I invite you to join me as we take a conversational and personal look into the lives and minds of leaders in medicine. I don't want you to miss a single one of these conversations. So make sure that you subscribe to this podcast, which will automatically notify you when new episodes are dropped. And follow us on Instagram and Facebook at Shadow Me Next, where we will review highlights from this conversation and where I'll give you sneak previews of our upcoming guests. Some career paths are mapped out step by step, but not Fedna Morensi's. She started out in accounting and dreaming of dance, only to find herself drawn to athletic training, where long hours on the sidelines gave her a front row seat to medicine and action. That exposure opened the door to the PA profession, and she's never looked back. Fedna takes us through her journey from sports medicine to orthopedic surgery and eventually into a career many people don't know about. Locum's travel work. She shares what it means to support communities with limited access to care, why financial literacy is essential for clinicians, and how she turned career uncertainty into a thriving business that gave her both freedom and purpose. Along the way, she reflects on lessons learned from contracts that didn't pan out, the importance of being your own advocate, and how to design a life outside of medicine while still doing the work you love. Please keep in mind that the content of this podcast is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only and should not be considered as professional medical advice. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer, or company. This is Shadow Me Next with Fedna Morensi. Fedna, thank you so much for taking the time to join us on Shadow Me Next. I am so excited to talk to you about something in medicine that not a lot of people are very familiar with.

Fedna:

Yes, yes. Until COVID happened.

Ashley:

So true. So true. COVID came with its very fair share of challenges, but I think um I think locum's work is one of those things. That and uh picking up groceries from your car. Those are two of the silver linings of COVID for me for sure. Yeah. So, Fennett, tell me a little bit about your background. Um, what what drew you to medicine in the first place? And did you always know that you wanted to be a PA?

Fedna:

Yeah, great question. Um so I grew up in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and I always played sports. I played sports when I was in high school. I wanted to play basketball in college, which I did try out for a D1, my sophomore year, but they only had one spot. So I wasn't, you know, I wasn't too thrilled about not getting a scholarship or whatever. So that was that. Um, but uh my first injury happened when I was playing basketball in high school. I got introduced to the athletic trainer. And when I went to school at USF in Tampa, I decided to major in accountant and dancing because I like numbers and I like to dance. So I remember I was taking like a um body and voice improv class, and we had to like act and do dances. It was the best class ever. And then um, and there was another intro to dance class I was taking, and I met a girl who was majoring in sports medicine, and while I was doing my dancing class, I couldn't see a future where I would be able to provide for myself, myself, and help my family. And I'm like, you know, I think I gotta like not do that one thing I'm crazy about or I think I'm crazy about, and do something else that I like, I enjoy, and that makes sense. Also, I tried out for like these dance teams on campus, and I wasn't making the dance team, so I don't know if dancing was in my future. I'm like, yeah, this is not working out. So I'm kind of glad I like Shiv Gear. So um I got introduced to sports medicine and I pursued it. I did athletic training. Extremely, extremely hard, which I will say really got me prepared for PA school because they kind of had the similar standards of like they only accept so many people every year. You had a standard of like maintaining a certain GPA, you took quizzes, you took tests, you you had all the applied sciences, you took care of real athletes, you traveled with them. Like you had like a group of people you had to take uh care of. When I did football, the wide receivers were my guys. I had to take care of them and follow them around. When I did volleyball, you know, I took care of the girls, I traveled with them. As a student, it was so much fun. I loved it because I'm a very active person. And my last semester of sports medicine athletic training, that's when I was introduced to the paid profession. When Larry Collins, who's well known in Florida, um, a popular PA in Florida, he taught a portrait of the course last semester, crazy. And I'm like, oh, what is this? This is cool. So I took like a year off after I graduated, I did my sports med thing, athletic training thing, and I continued to look into the PA profession um because prior to that I was on a DPT route. But the PTs I work with as an athletic trainer, they were um they were advising me to look into something else, which I did. So one of my mentors, he actually he was a PT, he was a DPT. He would mentor me and he actually ended up going back to school and became an orthopedic oncologist. And he was my mentor. Oh my gosh. I know crazy. It's just so crazy. Everybody I was under kind of it made sense, it all made sense. So when I decided to pursue the degree, like it was just getting better and better, and the profession was just grown at the time. I went in at a really good time. Um, and I went to Rutgers, I was in Florida, and I kind of had like the idea of let's kind of do something similar to undergrad. You got to get away from home, get away from distractions, but not too far away from everybody, or go somewhere where you have somebody close or a family member. If something happened to you, you have somebody to go to. So I ended up going to Jersey from Florida. Um, I was 28 at the time, and it was like the best decision ever. It was a different culture. You know, I got to see the four seasons. Um, the hustle was different, the mindset was different. And but that's how I ended up being a physician assistant. Um, I knew being in sports medicine, I like to work with people. Um, it made me feel good to like kind of give back and play a part in people's well-being. So it made sense to me. Um, nothing else made sense. I was like, okay, well, I don't want to go to med school. I I never really looked into med school enough like I was a pre-med student. No, I just got introduced to PA and I just went full throttle. Like when I was taking my organic chemistry class, people were like, why don't you just go to med school? You only got one more class to take it. I'm like, I want to go to med school. Like, why do you guys have a problem with me choosing this route and be okay with it? Um, so that's how I ended up in PA school. It was it was great, it was hard for sure. Um, Rutgers have different programs. They have the three plus three, where you actually get um accepted your your your your senior year in high school. So you so you get your bachelor's and your master's six years. Um, they also have a part-time program, and then they have the full-time. So they have a lot of options, which is great. It's an excellent program. Um, graduated from Rutgers, decided to stay in Jersey. I liked that it worked out. Um, I did orthopedic surgery. That's what I always wanted to do, but I also fell in love with cardiology. I promise you, the only two things that make sense to me is cardiology and orthopedic surgery. Don't ask me about endocrine. I've never really liked it. So um I love cardiology. I would do anything in cardio. That was my next baby. But I ended up doing orthopedic surgery because that's what I wanted to do. And within orthopedic surgery, I actually specialized in many subspecialties. Um, multi-specialty was like the first thing I got exposed to. The first group I worked with had everybody. They had hand, they had um, you know, um non-surgical sports medicine, spine. Um, what else they had? Joint, trauma, everything. So podiatry with an ankle specialist. The only thing they did not have is orthopedic oncology, which I got to experience when I travel um in San Francisco to work in orthopedic oncology for about six months, which in itself was an amazing experience as well. So, yeah, I worked um three years into my job. Um, because that was my second job. My I left my first job within the first year and a half. I left it because um some things were not adding up. But let me tell you why I don't regret it. Unfortunately, everybody, if you want to do well, it takes a lot of repetition. So it's it's good to set a goal and know that there's a light at the end of the tunnel. You will not be in darkness forever. But you gotta get those reps in, you gotta get your skills and you gotta get it up so that you leverage those skills later. Okay, so when I look back, I didn't know any better. I'm like, it was everything that I got exposed to that actually prepared me for where I'm at now. Now, the circumstances weren't always great. Matter of fact, most of the time they weren't great because of the way that they structured the job. Prior to COVID, things were just different. The system had leverage, they had power. You didn't really have a voice. I think post-COVID, people felt like they had a voice. So the soft skills were people were um valuing that more. Where prior to that, voice, no, time off. No, you know, but we found our voice after COVID because we realized there's there's more to there's more to life than work. There's more to life than just being a PA. PA is part of who you are, not who you are. Right. So you have to know the difference, um, you know, about your profession, which you like, your career, and your actual life.

Ashley:

Fedness Point brings up an excellent quality question. A question you might hear on interview for your own healthcare program. Tell me about a time when you realized your career or studies were just one part of your identity. How did you protect space for yourself outside of that role? For interviews, this is gold. It shows balance, perspective, and emotional resilience. Keep in mind that there's more interview prep, such as mock interviews and personal statement review, over on shadowmext.com. There you'll find amazing resources to help you as you prepare to answer your own quality questions.

Fedna:

So those were the lessons that happen um pre-COVID. That my second job after I left the first one. Um, I was there for, I actually like that job because when we didn't have any cases, or if the cases were canceled, I went home. I went home and I appreciated the flexibility. Um and then they somehow try to add, like, well, we don't want you to go home. Let's try to add something, which never came to fruition. Thank God. Um before that can even happen, they actually folded. It was a small group. They folded, they gave everybody a 60-day notice, um, which I which I talk about on LinkedIn, by the way. That's how I started traveling. They gave everybody a 60-day notice, and um, we got a severance pay for 90 days or something, which was like a nice little break, but I was hardly three years in. I'm losing my mind. I support myself. I'm the breadwinner. So it's like, oh my gosh, where do you go from there? So when it came time, once the once the company folded, I remember that um the nurse told me that PAs and physicians travel. So, as you know, as a PA, you do not get a job overnight, not even in one month. There's credentialing, there is licenses, um, there's a lot of things that you have to do to actually secure a position that you appreciate. And the paperwork can be tricky sometimes. So you really want to take your time to read things and even have a lawyer look at it or an experienced PA because a lot of times we don't know what we don't know until we cross that bridge. And that's how a lot of people learn lessons, right? Like the hard way, not intentionally. It just happens because people are not talking about it. So um I remembered about the traveling PA, and I'm like, all right, let's let's go ahead and apply. Because even three years out, as I was interviewing, nothing changed. Matter of fact, the salary offers were less than what it was when I was out of school or about the same. I was kind of shocked too. I'm like, you know what? No, I'm just gonna try this and go there. And um, I remember I had a PA friend, she would talk to me about 1099 and W2, and she decided to go from full-time salary W2 to 1099, and she'll have the same job. She'll do um, she did 1099 to ICU in the E in the ER, and same job, but more pay. And I want people to understand that when I talk about travel P, I talk about money. The reason why I talk about the money is because I get to do what I love regardless, but I get to do it with less stress and I get I get a I get a better pay. And these two loans are not cheap, guys. Okay, so we need that. We need the pay, we need to be compensated fairly, we need to ask for what we want. Um, and you're also valued a little bit more because you're going somewhere where um, you know, there's no access or people have to drive three hours to get somewhere. So the community really kind of appreciates you just having somebody there to just serve the community. Like you you feel like you're doing, you know, your good deed. You feel like, okay, I'm really providing the service to the patients, I'm serving them and they actually appreciate it. The patients always appreciate it, but the practice and the people who work there actually appreciate you too. So um, yeah, the the the job folded in 2017. I started traveling in 2018 and I never look back. And I know I talk about 1099 and W-2. Everybody, if you're listening, the W-2 is essentially it's your regular job that everybody has, where half of your um half of your Medicare, Medicaid are paid into you, right? Um, your your work pays for that portion. There's also um employer-sponsored retirement plan, like 401k, and they match. This is what your W-2. These are some of the benefits. Um, 1099 is just straight pay. That means that you are responsible for everything, including having your own um self-employed retirement plan, which there are a lot of options. It's just that it's not something that we talk about. We don't know the options that we have, but you can go straight out of school and even, hey, do you do 1099? Can you do that? And just form your own structure. And there's pros and cons to all of it, but we'll save that for another day. But as a travel PA, I did have the option of doing both. Interestingly enough, I learned a lot about the business of medicine because what I knew was W-2, and that's what I went into. And then I started to hear about the 1099. I looked more into it, and that's how I was able to form my business. And I am an employee of my business. My business is the S-corp. And that part is because I make a certain amount. Most accounting would say between 60 to 75K, that you can form your S Corp so that you can get all the benefits that come with 1099's business that get the 10 benefits. And you basically you hire yourself. Um, and you know, learning the business of medicine has helped me tremendously. Um, I still get the things I would get as a regular employee. I have liability insurance, I have healthcare insurance, I have everything that a regular job would give you, except my company offers me that, right? So it's been amazing because again, I get to do what I love and I don't have to work as much to um, you know, to get compensated to enjoy my life outside of work. So I decided, you know, I don't have to work full-time. I work like six to nine months out of the year. So yeah, and here I am, and I'm not looking back. I was a good um steward, I'm gonna say, of my money. I save, I've been, I invest because it's easy to be like, oh my gosh, I make so much money, let's spend it. But that's not the goal. The goal is to make your money work hard for you because you already work hard for it, and then design the life that you want to so that you don't have to work for the rest of your life. And then you buy your freedom with your money. That's why you want to make it.

Ashley:

You are incredible. And guys, I swear I didn't send her any of these questions before, and she literally just answered every single thing that we were gonna talk about. I am going to circle back to a couple of the things that you said, which I think are just hugely important. And ironically, the things that as clinicians, SPAs, as MDs, even as DPTs, doctors of physical therapy, we're all thinking about these things. Um, and these play really big um roles in our careers, but we don't often talk about them with pre-health students or with shadows because it seems rather mundane, but it is really it's it underlines everything that we do and why we're working. So one of the things that you mentioned is picking your school. And I thought that this was so cool. Um, and even before when you're working in athletic training, it all kind of led to you working as a travel clinician, right? I mean, you traveled around with the football teams and the volleyball teams, and then um you traveled around a bit for school, and now here you are again traveling. So it's so nice to know that for those who do enjoy a new adventure and a new location, um, you can have that in medicine too, and still have a thriving social life and personal life and family life as well. So thank you for sharing that. That was incredible. Another thing that I wanted to mention that we talked about a lot, and this is the second to last thing I'll bring up, are the benefits of Locum's work, of being a travel PA. Um, less stress, better pay. You're solving a healthcare discrepancy. I mean, you are you are going to a place where care is really needed, where where your expertise is really needed. So all of those things are absolutely incredible. And maybe we can circle back in a few minutes and you can tell us if there are any challenges with travel, with travel locum's work as well. Um, but then the last thing I wanted to mention, and this is so important, is the business of medicine. And I think we've talked about this before on the podcast, but the business of medicine oftentimes has such a negative connotation to it, right? Um, but at the end of the day, the business of medicine is what allows medicine to keep going, at least right now in our country. And for us as clinicians, we have to be good stewards of our finances. You know, this is one of the things that gives us the ability not to burn out because we can invest in ourselves. We can invest in our hobbies and our activities and our rest is so important. Um, so I'm so glad you said that. And at the end of this, we'll talk a little bit about where people can find you and um and and perhaps um learn a little bit more from you about the 1099s and the W-2s and the contract reviews, which you mentioned, which is so important. So all of that was just so chalk full of gold. And I'm so grateful for you saying all of those things. But first, let's circle back to travel work. You know, we talked about the benefits. Is are there any challenges? Is there anything that you've that you've said, you know, this is something I'm gonna have to overcome? And and how did you do that?

Fedna:

Yeah, um, the challenges would be I'm a city girl. I like to be in the city, so I've gone to remote places and I'm like, yeah, it's not for me. Though I didn't like it, I appreciated it because I would have never gone somewhere like that. And I look back and I'm like, you know what, it was kind of nice not having distractions and just being in Wyoming and driving to um Yellowstone Park, you know, going to Montana. So you can turn the what you call negative. I don't think it's a negative, but you could turn a unfavorable situation into a favorable circumstance.

Ashley:

Perspective is so important, and you get to see that so much working in rural areas and you know, more urban or suburban areas. The the medicine is the same, but the way you practice it sometimes is a bit different. I would imagine you've learned something.

Fedna:

Oh my gosh. I think that has to be the thing that gave me so much confidence. We always wonder how are things done, but I got to see it on all the coasts. How are things done and the preference? So I have like all these, you know, all these little tricks in my toolbox that I get to travel with me, and that has to be one of the coolest things ever. And then you kind of get to see how unfortunate others are. And I'm gonna say are because I remember when I was at a travel gig, people were driving like two to three hours just to see a specialist. And for them, it was nothing. It was like the norm for them. They did not like, okay, it's whatever, it's what we do. But you know, it kind of make you appreciate some some of the things that you do have um based on where you are, because there are other places that they just don't have access and they got to go far. And then sometimes the facilities aren't as equipped as you know, places where I was like Yale and San Francisco, ECSF, things like that. So yeah, I it's I mean, the cultures were had to be um my most favorite part. The the people in the culture, that's always my favorite part, I would say. Another um con is just dealing with with agencies and recruiters, because if you're not a people person, if you're not business savvy or have somebody who's like kind of helping you and guiding you, you can really get played and you can really get um some of the conditions, like you may find yourself stuck in a contract that's hard to get out of, or you know, stuck in a contract um where you cannot start another one. You can, but it takes a while, you know. So you kind of have to stay on the game. It's like you work for yourself essentially, which is not a bad thing because as we learn, there's no such thing as job security. I learned that lesson prior to COVID, but people were learning it during COVID. So um do not think there's job security with the systems. However, your skill sets and your and your degree, you can create whatever you want to out of it, especially the way things are nowadays, especially with trying to modernize um our profession and having more authority. So I think the people where they are now and started in the PA profession, they are in a good place, they're in a good position to kind of help push it forward. And also, too, they are seeing what we did and what we are doing. So I think they kind of have like the blueprints, sort of, and kind of take it from there and just build upon it.

Ashley:

Absolutely. And that's such a great cautionary tale. You know, it we at the end of the day, you do have to look out for yourself. And and it's not uh, you know, that's not meant to scare anybody. That's just meant to give you a little bit of strength and knowledge right there, which is actually a perfect segue, Fedna. Tell us you have created some really incredible resources exactly for this to help people decide if travel work is correct for them, or perhaps realize that there are these issues with contracts that perhaps people might not be aware of. Right where can we find more out about this fabulous resource that you're offering?

Fedna:

Yes, I have free resources on my website called ww.thetravelinpa.com, and that's with two L's. Um, you can also find me on LinkedIn, just put Fedna Marin C and I'm on Instagram. There's not a lot of FedNas on Instagram. If you type, I'll be there. But it's um travelin pa underscore C is my IG handle. I'm also starting a travel PA community. I had I actually I started it last year and I am transitioning it and calling it travel PA Your Way to Wealth.

Ashley:

Oh, I love that. That's fabulous.

Fedna:

Starting next year, and it's basically everything travel PA. Um, and how I use the travel PA and how you can use the travel PA to design the life that you want while doing what you love and create an impact.

Ashley:

Absolutely incredible. Bedna, thank you so much for that incredible amount of information that you've shared and for taking the time to spend with us on Shadow Me Next today.

Fedna:

Yes. Well, thank you for having me. I appreciate it.

Ashley:

Thank you so very much for listening to this episode of Shadow Me Next. If you liked this episode or if you think it could be useful for a friend, please subscribe and invite them to join us next Monday. As always, if you have any questions, let me know on Facebook or Instagram. Access you want, stories you need, you're always invited to Shadow Me Next.

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Ashley Love

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