1 Year of Joint Effort PAs

One year. Fifty-plus episodes. Countless laughs, hot takes, clinical pearls, and a community we never imagined we'd build.

In this special anniversary episode, we're taking a step back to celebrate one year of Joint Effort PAs. We reflect on why we started the podcast, what we've learned along the way, some of our favorite moments, and how the show has evolved over the past year. From recording our very first episode to connecting with listeners across the country, this journey has been more meaningful than we ever expected.

We're also sharing what's next for Joint Effort PAs—the ideas we're excited about, where we hope to grow, and our vision for the future of the podcast and our profession.

Whether you've been with us since Episode 1 or you're just joining the conversation, thank you for being part of this community. Here's to one incredible year...and to whatever comes next.

🥂 Happy 1st Anniversary, Joint Effort PAs!  💜🦴🎙️

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome to Joint Effort PAs, where two orthopedic surgery PAs get real about life in medicine. From tips and tricks to professional growth, work-life balance, and everything in between. We're here to share what we've learned and what we're still figuring out. Let's get into it.

SPEAKER_00 0:22

I'm ready. All right. We're back. We're here. We're back for our birthday. This is a monumental occasion. It is. Yeah. One year anniversary. You should have had hats on. God damn it. Oh well. You could have brought the moose hat. I could have brought the moose hat. No, this is our um one-year anniversary of recording, joint effort PAs. And in um true fashion, Hannah has brought props. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

Happy birthday to us. Happy birthday to us. I got a lot of things screen printed from Staples. And I was telling Beth about this before we started. Um I got some things screen printed that had pictures of bones on them. And the people from Staples called me and were like, what is this? Like, we need to know more information. Um, I don't know if it was out of concern or like, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:05

I mean, do they think I'm a serial killer now? Maybe. There's a little bit of that vibe when you have like skeletons everywhere, but this is great.

SPEAKER_01 1:12

I love it. Yes. Absolutely love it. Happy birthday to us, guys. This has been a full year that we've done it every single week. Every single week. I think there was like one week.

SPEAKER_00 1:21

Uh there was a week we missed, but we double recorded to allow for the miss. Yeah. We also didn't replay any, like we didn't replay any old ones because we're going to be. Oh, yeah. Do some people do that? Yeah, I think a flashback Friday situation. Oh, okay. Well, not us. Yeah, in um in memory and celebration of our one year. Um, let's take it back to the beginning. We're gonna get reflective. We're gonna get really reflective. Um, so I mean, again, Hannah and I had talked about starting a podcast. Hannah works with a hand surgeon, and they had been on a um very creative fluff thing, right? Um, and this podcast thing was like an idea that was lingering out there. And um, Hannah and I talked about it, and you were kind of like, hey, we're thinking about doing this. And I was like, 100% you should do that. Um and my intention was just to impart knowledge, have a space where we could talk about the everyday happenings, um, educate new PAs, uh, be a listening board for current PAs, give advice, you know, not like, you know, dear Debbie advice, but like give advice. Kind of. I mean, kind of.

unknown 2:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:30

And I think it has turned into being that, but I also think it's turned into a very cool place for us to talk about weekly happenings. Yes. Um, so I think our listeners will be surprised to believe that um as we plan for the the weeks, we don't really have an outline. We don't, and there's no team behind us. It is literally just us. Yeah. Um no producer. There's no producer. Um in fact, the space in which we record has changed a bit.

SPEAKER_01 3:00

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 3:00

It's getting demolished right now. It's getting demolished right now.

SPEAKER_01 3:03

So if you hear construction equipment, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:05

But um anyway, so let's do a little bit of behind the scenes just like how we get to where we're gonna be, and then we'll well hold on. In typical fashion, Hannah Closure Week.

SPEAKER_01 3:16

The week, the weekly review. I had a weird week. Yeah, yeah. My doc was out of town on vacation, and so it was solo Hannah Clinic week. But I actually did, and I'm proud of myself. Everybody should be proud of me. I took two days off. Now, the first day I took off shouldn't have been, I'm not even gonna count that. I mean, I'm not taking it back as PTO, but I would did work the entire day. Oh, yeah, that's how it goes. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:42

That's how my entire vacation vacation was.

SPEAKER_01 3:44

Yeah, I was I was literally on the phone the whole day. I went to the hospital to discharge somebody. Like I was wearing scrubs the entire day. I'm like, why did I choose to do that? But whatever. Yeah. Then um Thursday, I I actually did take like I'm not gonna say I didn't do any work, but I did a mixture that felt more like a day off. Like I worked out in the middle of the day. It felt like a Saturday. Yeah, it felt like a weekend, and it was really nice. So I got some other things done. I read an entire book in one day. That's one of the Freedom McFadden books, which I'm not a reader, but I've read in the past three weeks three of her books.

SPEAKER_00 4:17

Yeah, I speed read, I speed read those on vacation. Those are like my I should give you all my books. I literally have 12 books at home. Of hers? Yeah. They're so good.

SPEAKER_01 4:25

Yeah. Um, because they're like, I feel like I have it figured out, and then I definitely don't. So I did that. Um, and then I actually I went out for drinks with some of our reps afterwards, and this topic, this exact topic came up. They were like, So what's your topic? Or like what's your outline theme for the week? And I was like, it's not done yet. They were like, well, but it's so soon. But it's Thursday night. Yeah. Okay. And I was like, no, we actually most of the time don't really go into it with a great plan or outline unless Beth has like a thought you know, in the shower, uh, you know, in the middle of the night or something, and emails it to me. Um, but otherwise we don't really go in with like some weeks we have had a solid plan.

SPEAKER_00 5:07

Not most though. And out of the 52 weeks that we have done, yeah, I would say 10 of those were really scripted. Yeah. Like where we had guests that we needed to come on, or we we planned to come on where we we knew what we were gonna talk about.

SPEAKER_01 5:20

I feel like the most scripted is like not my favorite, though. I'm not it I'm not a scripted individual. No, no, I know that.

SPEAKER_00 5:25

No, no, no, no.

SPEAKER_01 5:27

Our most scripted episodes were the hardest for me to listen to.

SPEAKER_00 5:31

I know, no, I know. Um, but no, you you did have a unusual week. Yeah, yeah, which means it it should, you should feel good going into next week.

SPEAKER_01 5:39

Next week is still unusual though. I have three normal days and then no OR Thursday again. Oh, yeah. Yeah, so it whatever. Whatever. I'll go back to normalcy in a couple weeks and it'll be the hell on earth I've always dreamed of. Perfect. And I can't wait. How was yours?

SPEAKER_00 5:56

Um, it was okay. So I entered the week Monday. I come into clinic, clinic's gonna be full. I'm still without a medical assistance, so I've got these rotating ones. So um again, I'm doing my best, best thing, which is to not be an asshole and not have this like face of this day's gonna suck. Because when I do that, it sucks. Right. So I'm decided to be, you know, uh positive, optimistic, whatever. So I get in and I am transitioning my role of in charge of the Indre Express providers to just in charge of the non-indreal express providers. Anyway, so there's a new person in charge of Indo Express. Walk in, first thing, they're like, hey, we don't have any coverage in our main office on a Monday during sports season. And I was like, Let me check. So I had assigned um the person covering to go do a spine clinic because they're kind of in the middle of that. I communicated that, and then there was no coverage. So, whatever. My instinct was like, not my job. And my other instinct was like, I can fix this. So found somebody to cover, and then I'm thinking to myself, four to eight tonight, and like when everyone goes home. Wait, look, there's sports physicals tonight. I signed up for that. Somebody told me, had them send me a calendar invite. I was planning on being here until 7, 10. Oh my gosh. So I was like, you know what? I'll just do it all. I'll just do it. I'll cover it. Plus all sports physicals. So halfway through the day, my interim medical assistant was like, hey, there's 176 sports physicals signed up. And I was like, is that a lot? So it was myself and two other PAs that were manning the sports physicals. However, one of them was covering urgent care at the time. This 83-year-old guy came in for his back, maybe his hip, we don't know. He stood up, passed out. Oh, and it happened in the x-ray room. So now all the resources are in the x-ray room, trying to like get this guy, and he, you know, lost, lost bladder control. So now it's like, hey, what's the real issue going on here? Is it because you're 83, or is it because you got like a really bad issue? So he's doing that, right? So now I'm like, wait, I'm finishing clinic. My new medical assistant came in to meet me at that time. I was like, hey, can't do it right now. Let's do it tomorrow. I got to urgent care. And there's like 10 or 15 sports physicals. So I look back at like the medical assistant and I was like, hey, you you guys want to like help get those back? Like, I'm finishing up here, but I'll start over here. And they were like, No, we have to go set up for the mass sports night. Right. I was like, no, no, no. How about you either stay here and do this or take the 15 people here and you start mass sports physicals night early? Yeah. So that that's what they're doing. Yeah, that's what they like. And we'll be more, you know, and 176 is like 100. Yeah, we're gonna look like we did the best one ever. Yeah. So that was Monday. So like that was one day. I ended up staying here until it wasn't that bad. I stayed here until like 8:30, because by the time that all went out, yeah. There was a couple patients that came in, but like, whoo, that was Monday. Um, Tuesday was surgery day. That was um that was great. Much needed. Much needed. A lot of varied cases. And then Wednesday is clinic. Um, and then the rest of the week was all the other things, the unexpected things and the expected things. We had a great surgery day Friday, did two ACLs and Oats. We hadn't done Oats in a while, and then a rotator curve revision. The Oats procedure was textbook. Textbook. Like I don't remember the last time we did an oats. That was like lesion, drill out, get the implant, cut it, measure it, size in, we're done. And it just went textbook. And it was at a facility we never go to. The equipment was stuff that we don't use. Like the room was set up in a way we didn't want to, you know, like it was all the variables for it not to go well, and it just went very, very smoothly.

SPEAKER_01 9:38

That's good. The one where the screen is right in your face. Yeah, the one where the screen's right in your face.

SPEAKER_00 9:42

But um amazing. Yeah, no, it was it was uh it was a crazy week. I just described Monday, but every day was more or less like that. So Monday was hopefully the worst of the days. It's how the week started, and I was like, uh, but no, it's okay. It was it was good. So um I've got actually story of the week. Okay. I come into urging I come into uh surgery on Friday, and my badge reel, I went to go take my badge because I normally wear it like top, yes, instead of pocket instead of low. I took my badge and I went to go scan it to get in the door, and the badge reeled it didn't swirl back in. Yeah. So now it's hanging at my foot. And I was like, this is gonna be a problem. So I walked around clinic trying to find a new badge reel with our company's logo on it, couldn't find one. And then I went to um uh pre up pack you, and this one girl was like, Hey, I can fix it, you just have to pop the thing off and rewind it. So I went in to do my case, came out, and she was like, Hey, it's it's not fixable. Like it's time yours died. It's time you say goodbye to that. And I was like, you know what? That is very um metaphoric for this entire week and month. It is time to say goodbye. It's time to move on. So on from what else? Oh my god, I have a staff member leaving, I have a PA that's been with me for five years that's leaving, my medical assistants leaving. Um, there's just a lot of things to do.

SPEAKER_01 11:01

Move on from those things and move forward on so many other things. Yes. I mean, we have already in the you know, 30 minutes or whatever that we debrief before starting these, we've solved a lot of the world's problems and we have so many ideas for the future.

SPEAKER_00 11:16

Yes. So I can't wait. Yeah, so that was the week. And yes, my badge reel is serving some universal purpose different than what it actually is. So we'll touch on that later. But um a metaphorical badge reel. It is a metaphorical badge reel.

SPEAKER_01 11:29

So I had to get what rid of one of mine this week, too. Yeah, it's my one with the the skeleton hands, same piece. Yeah, my new one is SpongeBob holding up a uh a plate. Okay, but staples is supposed to make you a new one.

SPEAKER_00 11:45

Staples should be making us new ones, as long as they don't judge you after your last drop-off, but I digress. I'm uh I'm banned from staples. Um, so let's go a little bit behind the scenes just so we can give our listeners a little um a little insight as far as how we get to where we are right now. So, for instance, today, as far as where and when, we decide that maybe like two days ago. Yes. Yeah, yes. Um, this is all on our own time. We generally record on the weekends, um, which is hard because we both have stuff going on. I mean, we have a lot more soccer games going on. I do, but Hannah's in Las Vegas some weekends. Oh, it is. She's like Las Vegas one weekend, yeah. So um we play we record on the weekends. Um, Hannah has all the recording equipment stuff, which I still don't know where and when I would show up with like a karaoke mic and hope it hope for the best. Yeah, yeah. But Hannah's the brains behind all of this stuff. Um, our outlines for what we talk about are somewhat um on the fly. And somewhat chat GPT. And somewhat chat GBT'd. So we'll go with like one idea and then that will um turn into a full on topic.

SPEAKER_01 12:53

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:54

Now I will tell you, and those that listen weekly will know we have minimum 30 to 45 minute pre-recording debriefing. Correct, yes. And like today.

SPEAKER_01 13:07

Yeah. Today was probably one of the days that like we joke, like, this could never be aired. Today really it couldn't. Like, but will it one day? I think that's what we've concluded.

SPEAKER_00 13:20

One thing we can talk about as we go into the next 52 episodes is maybe we record one of these bad boys. Yeah. Where we go just, and I'm talking like we're not sitting. Yeah. Like we were both like positioned at the far ends of the room. Like whatever.

unknown 13:35

I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 13:36

Um, yeah, I mean, sometimes sometimes we have the dog in here, sometimes we have somebody else in here. I don't know, like it goes a little crazy, but we debrief for a 30 to 45 sometimes about the episode, but not really. Yeah, mostly not.

SPEAKER_01 13:49

Mostly about the musings of the prior week, the things that have happened, personally and professionally, to us or others. So uh okay. Um, do you have a favorite episode that we've done?

SPEAKER_00 14:05

I enjoyed thoroughly the surgeon personality episode. Yes, that was a good one. I just I really liked that one. That was like a a creative um translation into real life. I I really liked that one. Yeah, um, we did an ethical one too, that I could do five or six more of those because I feel like those are very helpful for uh newer PAs. Uh, but those two were my favorite. Yeah. No issue. I liked the Ortho Crushes one. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 14:35

No, that was a good one too. Yeah. That was like to talk about my favorite things to do. So that was a that was a favorite. What about one that you think like do you have an episode that you're like, oh my god, I was so excited about this? And then like nobody seemed as excited as you feel like you didn't get the feedback you were hoping for.

SPEAKER_00 14:56

So I will I will address, you know, I will address some of that. So we have had a couple guests on the show. Yes. And um all willing, right? Like these are all people who are like, hey, I want to come on. And we ask, like, yeah, they, you know, they didn't really seek us out, but we've had a couple guests on the show that I think um in theory, in pre-recording, spot on. In recording.

SPEAKER_01 15:21

I I made myself little notes before this, and uh, there is a phenomenon that happens to everybody who we would bring on. They're like their personality is one thing, and I'm like, yeah, like they're they're gonna sound this way, and then all of a sudden, you turn it on and they're like, flat, hey, my name is Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:39

So, and it's like gone quietly. I know. So we had a couple, a couple guests who got the yips, yeah. Which again, I maybe on us. Like, what do we do? What do we do to like lease cinema? Three shots of tequila before everything. And maybe, maybe they have to to get like this, they have to be involved in the pre-combo. Yeah. I don't know, you know, but I feel like too many gimmicks forces them to feel a certain way they're not feeling. Yeah. But um, you know, I I think we we have somewhat of a casual tone. And I think those that come on want to hold that professionalism, which is fine. I'm not gonna say no, but I think when you lose that casual tone or it doesn't go with ours, we we we have to work a little bit harder to pull it out.

SPEAKER_01 16:22

Yeah, like let me, and then it takes like 45 minutes before I'm like, yes. Yes, we now you've said something that yeah, this is this could be good.

SPEAKER_00 16:30

Yeah, yeah. So I think uh going forward, if we were we do, we're talking to a couple of our physical therapy PA friends. If we do another one, I think we um I think we should change the time of day.

SPEAKER_01 16:42

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:43

Like a like a happy hour situation.

SPEAKER_01 16:45

Yeah, like maybe more of an evening. Maybe they've like they're not like so hyper focused on this is this thing. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:51

So and I think that is like a goal. Like I want to bring more people on. Yes. And even if it's like remote, finding some some people who you know we can connect with that we don't know. It doesn't always have to be people that we interact with every single day. That is true. That could be the most exciting. And we actually through this podcast met some PAs um from the PAOS, and we were on their podcast.

SPEAKER_00 17:18

And so that that was a huge connection that I was not expecting. Um, I think when we started, the hope was that we would have some listeners that would just be, you know, ideally some of our colleagues, which again, I think we've got 40% of our colleagues.

SPEAKER_01 17:34

I I think we have a good number of our colleagues who listen casually versus um, you know, every single episode. And I appreciate the ones who listen to every single episode. I call them the number one fans. Um, I want you to know, I'm gonna say this on air because it's not ever gonna be heard, but the person who has stabbed you in the back before, metaphorically. Yes, okay, I know exactly what you're talking about. Hasn't listened to one single episode.

unknown 18:01

What is it?

SPEAKER_01 18:02

Never listened to one. I know, I know. I know. Wow. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:06

Wow, that just affirms all of my feelings for this individual. I knew it used to be family to be generated.

SPEAKER_01 18:14

Yeah, like, oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 18:15

Well, I know though, but when I mean we don't we used to talk about it a lot when it was like new, but we don't talk about it like throughout the week a lot. But we have a bunch of our reps that um that listen. Um, we have a bunch of our fellow PAs that listen, a few of our docs that listen religiously. Um and some of the PAs that we used to work with that I've talked to casually, they listen still. Yeah. Which is kind of really cool. Um, but our intention was to I get just find a space where we can talk about um things and have our voice be heard. Um Hannah and I feel like we have a lot in common just in the lives that we navigate. Um, and I think it's it's helped, I don't know. I think it's helped decompress.

SPEAKER_01 18:54

It's a therapy session for us, and it is a session of education for others. For everybody else.

SPEAKER_00 19:00

You guys are welcome.

SPEAKER_01 19:01

And 51 episodes.

SPEAKER_00 19:02

But I will tell you, we don't record the the meaty stuff in the meaty. Yeah. We can't. Yeah, we can't. And I don't know if we have to come up with another podcast for that.

SPEAKER_01 19:13

Yeah, but we're gonna have to do the thing, you know, like on true crime documentaries where their voices are like, yeah, I'm gonna smear my voice.

SPEAKER_00 19:21

Yeah. Um, but no, I think I think going back to your original question, the yes, I think we have to fine-tune that. Yeah. And I think that that we have a lot. Um, again, we've yet to have a rep come on. Yeah. Um I do I did love Emily who came on as our nurse practitioner. Um no, sorry. CRNA. She's a CRNA. She came on and we had April come on as our nurse practitioner. So I think those were those were very good episodes. Just again to to not hear our voices. Um Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:49

Yeah. I like bringing on some some outside perspective and like some um, what do you call it, interdisciplinary collaboration. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, that was good. We have had 4,012 downloads of our podcast. That's that's a lot, isn't that? Yeah. Yeah. I was looking at um like some of our stats for all 51 episodes. Um, most are 95% of our listeners are in North America, but we have had one download in Africa. Um well, actually, of all time, we have had 27 downloads in Africa, 37 in South America, 94 in Europe, 98 in Asia, and forgive me for my naivety. Naivete. Naivete. 16 in Oceania? What is that? I'm not sure. Yeah. It sounds like the it's like down under Asia. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 20:40

It sounds like down under like Bermuda or something.

SPEAKER_01 20:43

What is that? Country.

SPEAKER_00 20:45

I don't know. Oh, that's like it's like Australia, is it not?

SPEAKER_01 20:49

Australia's Oceania? Okay. Well, 16 people from Oceania, wherever that is. So please, if you're the listener from Oceania, inform me. Please educate me. And I'm just I'm interested to know about PA life over yonder.

SPEAKER_00 21:03

Now, uh, again, for those that listen, we we gained traction. We did have a spot on PAOS. That was really, really cool. I loved that. Um, and uh we have had some fan mail. We have had some fan mail, yes, yes. Um some they're all PAs, yes. Yeah. Some providers writing in and just saying, hey, I love what you guys do. Can you talk about this? Or hey, I have this situation, can you talk about this? So I love that.

SPEAKER_01 21:26

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:27

I really do it.

SPEAKER_01 21:27

It makes me feel like there's purpose to this. Oh, yeah. I want this to be helpful for people and I want it to be fun. And I more than anything, I just want it to be a relatable thing. I want to know that there's others out there like myself. It helps me help me help you.

SPEAKER_00 21:41

Now, now I think it's interesting though, when I graduated PA school in 2007, um, this was not a thing. There was no like place to talk about this. It would be go to conferences and network on your own, which again is still an option, but I think this is more accessible. I think we can, you know, say what we want to say. And this Is not necessarily like if I'm going to a conference, let's say it's trauma, let's say it's sports med, then I'm signing up for these um lectures. This is not this is not what I'm signing up for. Yeah, like yeah, but it's still valuable.

SPEAKER_01 22:10

This is, this is like you like to say, every episode is educational, whether or not we talk about patelephemoral pain syndrome or we talk about um what it's like to be a female who doesn't get hurt unless she yells or dating.

SPEAKER_00 22:24

Yeah. We also though, so I have uh again, some of the episodes I thought were gonna be a little bit not well received, those are the ones that I got the most feedback from. Like I would get the text from the side or nurse that was like, man, that was a good episode. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:37

That or that's the fire emoji. I miss getting the fire emoji in the mornings. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:42

Is it something I'm doing wrong? I don't know. Why do we care what other people think? I don't know. Well, that's part of that's part of the syndrome. Yeah, yeah. Um okay. So some bigger questions, and again, this is like, you know, a little reflective piece here. Um what has medicine taught you outside of medicine? And how has this podcast like brought that to light?

SPEAKER_01 23:08

Yeah, like what has this taught me about my personal self? Yeah. Or about people or about whatever. Well, I think this like is a way to be more expressive and outgoing for things. Like, you know, we exist in our little worlds, and I want to be bigger than that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:26

And this is a way to do that. So I think it's, yeah, that's very important. You have your patient encounters that are in the room, and then you have her personal life, which is all things that are just not medicine related, right? And then this is that nice merging of the two. Like we can debrief about stuff, but also relate like human beings outside of this. I think that's a that's a nice place.

SPEAKER_01 23:45

So I'm gonna tell you something. I have a dating app. Um, and I go back and forth between deleting them and non-deleting them because I'm like, this is garbage. Um, they're just they suck. Don't recommend. Okay. Zero out of 10. Anyway, somebody messaged me. I do have like a section on there that it's like, ooh, two truths and a lie, like interesting things about yourself. And one of my things is like I have a podcast, which I assume most people would be like, oh, that's clearly the lie, but it's not. This is the truth about me. And somebody um messaged me and was like, hey, um, looks like you're really passionate about your job, but is that all you do? It looks like you don't do a good job separating the two. I'm like, first of all, what the fuck? Like, come on strong. Like, yeah, I immediately like, I'm about to delete that app later because the audacity.

SPEAKER_00 24:34

That's the whole undertone. The whole undertone is that like you're right. Okay. No, I mean, the whole undertone is that like you and I, I think have found this little area because we are so passionate about what we do. And it doesn't just end when we drive away or when we close the door. Like these topics unearth other things about ourselves. Yes. Um, uh, it helps us, you know, debrief about something that didn't feel quite right or that was amazing. Like, I think it's like a nice place to be able to take that part of us. But but again, what is special to us, like this is a huge part of our identity, you know? And it's not like we need it to survive, but I love it so much. Yeah, yeah, I do. I mean, like it's thank you, Staples.

SPEAKER_01 25:19

Yeah. Um, yeah, I think that that is the thing. Like, it's okay. So I think like for other people who are super passionate about their work and like, you know, furthering their careers, I I think sometimes you get told like that's not the only thing that's important in life. And that's true. Yeah. It's not untrue. Yeah. But it is also okay to be very passionate about those things and to like have a little bit less work life balance than some others. Like, it's great when you have work life balance and everybody should, but maybe some people have a little bit less and that's okay too. Like, that's not a bad thing.

SPEAKER_00 25:55

But I still think like we're breaking the mold a little bit on normalizing that. Yeah. Like it's never, and again, I I don't, I never intended this to be like a feminist vibe, and we will like flirt with that a little bit, but it's it's never my intention to say, like, oh, you know, we're the only ones in the world who are doing this. Like we're we're not. Um, we're, you know, we're paving the road for a lot of other people who can do all these things. Like you can have a thriving social life, you can be a major part of your family, but also be super involved in the weeds with what's going on here. Yeah. You know, and then grow within that. Like things don't have to stagnate because you need to take time off to do whatever, you know. Um, I don't know. I think I think we're normalizing it a little bit more for any female who thinks, like, well, I can't be a PA because then I can't have a family, or I can't be a PA because then I can't go to all the social things I want to go to. Like, I think we are doing a very good job, whether we're intending to or not, just telling people, like, hey, this is like this is okay.

SPEAKER_01 26:56

Yeah. Or like you have to pick one or the other. I'm the person with the boundaries and the work-life balance, or I'm not.

SPEAKER_00 27:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:04

And there's somewhere in the world.

SPEAKER_00 27:06

Everybody's work-life balance is defined by what their balance is, right? I mean, I we have some providers we work with that um put as minimal effort into work as they can just to get the job done, and then their life exists outside of that, which is fine. And then we have some that are here all the time and that they linger. And then there's people like us who get in, get out, and then, you know, wake up in the middle of the night with ideas or texting each other, you know, oh my God, I I heard about your case. Like, tell me everything, or you washed out this knee, like, tell me exactly what it looked like. Yeah. Yeah. Like, I don't know. Um, but anyway. Yeah. Um, okay. So what's something younger you worried about that you generally don't care about anymore? Because we've talked a lot about insecurities and such. Do you think you have grown it all this year in that? Has this been an outlet for you to care less?

SPEAKER_01 27:58

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think, well, do I care more about certain things? Yes. I think it's it's funny. And um our outline kind of touched on this at the beginning. I don't know how much into it we went, but like there's a lot, obviously, that we don't talk about on here, but I mean, there's some things that I talk about that I'm like, should I talk? Like, I know what what's gonna happen to me after I talk about this? Yeah, like should I have said that out loud? Yeah, yeah. And so I think like that helps me just be like, fuck it, whatever. Like, yeah, you know, I need to stop or I need to not care as much about that kind of stuff. Um, but yeah, no, that that happens all the time. I mean, how many times have you gotten a message from a coworker or somebody after an episode and been like, what the F. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:45

No, well, I mean, I was just talking with the doc I work with about this weekend and what we're gonna talk about and whatever. And I had asked him, because he was like, he's like, I'll pay anything for the the before the recording talk. And I was like, Oh no, for right now, if that's for you. But he had said, like, oh, I mean, yeah, sometimes there's some stuff you say. I'm like, wow, why did you say that? And I was like, Oh, like a lot or like a little bit. Yeah, like how much? No, but specifically he's kind of like a handful of times, but um, I don't know. I think professionally I do care a hundred percent about um the company, what the docs yeah, you know, I I want to make sure I'm representing my I'm representing the company with all the moves that I make. Exactly. All the time, right? Um, I think doing this allows me to have all of those, you know, inner thoughts that are not necessarily appropriately expressed in that setting right here. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. And it doesn't change the fact that like, you know, I am doing less of a job overall, but it just, I don't know. I feel like you can't robotically do one thing all the time and not have decompression.

SPEAKER_01 29:47

Yeah, you have to have like nothing, nothing is gonna be perfect. Um, so you know, have I said some things that I like stressed a little bit afterwards, and I was like, oh, do I edit that out? Nah.

unknown 29:58

No.

SPEAKER_01 29:58

Nobody's gonna listen to that and care. And then somebody does listen to it, and I'm like That's the one thing they care about. Right. But we do that was gonna happen. No, I don't edit all well. Initially at the beginning, I did edit a lot more out. And then I don't know if it was like laziness or what. I just stopped. I was like, eh, this is all gonna stay in there. So if there's like periods of silence or something, I'll edit that out just for time's sake. Or sometimes I'll take out chunks of things that I'm like, yeah, this isn't really this was a tangent. I'm gonna get rid of that. Um, but yeah, I'm not editing out other than when we mistakenly like saved the company name or something.

SPEAKER_00 30:34

Um, okay. So when do you think we'll be done with this? Oh my god. When we die. Okay, well, no, well, what where I'm going with this, I'm just asking it's a different way. Why are we still doing it? I think we have not even like unearthed a lot of topics.

SPEAKER_01 30:52

I think that this was like this first year was just breaching the surface of like figuring out what this is and like how to make it work and how to make it be a thing. I really do think there's more space for guests and bringing on outside opinions and like maybe getting more creative with like how things are delivered. Yeah. Like I definitely don't want to lose the um the, you know, just banter about the day-to-day life and like things that people can identify with that. Um, but as far as the educational stuff, there's a whole untapped area for that. Like we could have, what if we had like, you know, a whiteboard? Yes. Like point drawing. Yeah, like where you're drawing. Yeah. Yeah. What if we drew things for you guys? Wouldn't you love that?

SPEAKER_00 31:39

I think, I think um, continuing to do this as long as we continue to have ideas and um are reaching people that have positive, you know, um feedback for us. Yeah, that's the space that I want to live in. Yeah. Um, eventually, I would love to get into, I think we've talked about this, I'd love to get into some type of like teaching something or some type of, I'd love to have a conference for like how to survive in the profession. Yeah, something that is not, you know, not like, well, I would say CME worthy, it's because it is, but the abstractness of that. Like there's there's some bigger purpose for you and I being in these roles and living this life. I feel like we can impart far better knowledge going forward.

SPEAKER_01 32:25

I'm imagining like Sergeant Beth, like waking everybody up at 4 a.m. to do their CrossFit workout and getting a text mid-crossfit workout that, like, you know, somebody called out and that one of your post op patients just showed up to the ED and you need to get them admitted for an IND, and you have to do like a direct admin situation during your CrossFit workout, and she's like, figure it out. Just do it.

SPEAKER_00 32:49

Do it. No, I've like all of that, all of that. I feel like this is such an interesting and rewarding career that um you and I have navigated so many situations um with you know success, but also with humor. And I think people can learn from that. Yeah. And every week, every day, like today, came in. And Hannah's got a story of like, you'll never believe what happened to me last night. Like, I mean, and it's uh I I should not believe it. I can hopefully do that. Yeah. Um what do you hope listeners will get from us? What do you hope they have gotten from us?

SPEAKER_01 33:24

Um, a sense of community. Like, oh well, there's somebody else like living their best life like me out there. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:31

Um, but don't you think the profession itself, like being a PA, and again, you can't help but compare it to MD. And nurse practitioner, fine.

SPEAKER_01 33:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:40

You go to school, undergrad, then you go to PA school for two, two and a half years, right? And then you're living in a world where you have MDs or DOs that went to school for much longer, and there's this weird gap to start. But as you get five years in, 10 years in, 15 years in, it kind of all becomes like the same. You know what I mean? So I think there's there's this need to talk about living in that, I don't say deficit, but living in that gap world and how you deal with these situations and how how do you prove yourself, but also not, you know, you don't know that much. I think that that's that's where I'm hoping providers will listen in and say, like when you're feeling that little bit of insecurity, yeah, like we have We've been there. We've been there. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:24

We've been there.

SPEAKER_00 34:24

I did that yesterday. I did that yesterday, yeah. Or that's happened to me 10 times. Yeah. I swore that it would never happen to me again. Here we are, happened again, you know. Um, I just hope that listeners can find some uh reassurance and some confidence in listening to it. Solace, perhaps, from time to time. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:43

Um, but yeah, okay. Well, what about the future for this? Where where are we going from here? Um do you have any like dying wishes for or like intense wishes for the near future? What are we gonna like topic-wise?

SPEAKER_00 35:00

Yeah. Um, I want to talk about uh ACLs. I'm gonna talk about ACLs a little bit more. I want to go into because I'm right now, like football starts in our state two days ago. 2930 or something like that. So I'm seeing a lot of patients right now looking to be cleared for their ACL surgery. Um, I'm seeing a lot of patients who retour their ACL. You know, I think that that in and of itself is a three-parter. Yeah. Easy. Like how to be successful diagnosis, how to be successful in recovery, and how to, as a provider, help these patients return back to sport. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:32

That's a very great We need like an athletic trainer on the first one, like sideline diagnosis. And then, you know, we talk about it, and then we need a PT on the the end cap of that to discuss like the rehab and return to sports which we're thinking.

SPEAKER_00 35:49

And God forbid, you have a patient who successfully navigated that and then toward the other one. Hey, you know. So I think that that that that would be, I think, extremely helpful as I feel like that is year after year. I I feel like I struggle with that.

SPEAKER_01 36:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:03

Yeah. Just because it's always a new issue at some point. So I'd love to talk about that. Um, I'd love to do a little bit more appropriate debriefing, but I don't know that I can, I don't know that I can separate it. Like what we do that we don't record. I don't know that I can separate it, but there's a lot of good nuggets in there.

SPEAKER_01 36:21

You want to gift those pre-recordings. I do. Yeah. For the right price. I want to I want to gift those. Um that'll that'll be the Christmas gift this year. Okay. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 36:32

Like a little tiny, like old school tape.

SPEAKER_01 36:35

Or like a USB. Yes. You can wrap that up. Here you go. Here's everything. Um my God. What about you? Um, I mean, of course I want to incorporate some more hand and wrist topics. Why would I not? Um, but I think I just want to do more with the like guests and interdisciplinary stuff, like bring more people on and get more outside thoughts and opinions in between. And maybe like incorporate some more technology into everything. Maybe have like more video stuff. Maybe we can do some educational, like, here's an x-ray that's up and like let's run through that kind of stuff to to make things high yield too. Because I'm sure everybody loves listening to us on their way to work so that they can decompress. But what if um, you know, what if some of the times we can also be helpful when you're sitting down looking and watching and learning something. Yeah. I like it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:36

Cool. So overall, good year. This was a great year. It was a great year. Yeah. I think um from a creative standpoint, I feel like we did we did a good job. And um, you know, for better or worse, what we present on here is us.

SPEAKER_01 37:49

This is it. This is me in my rawest form, except not as raw as the 20 minutes prior. That is true.

SPEAKER_00 37:56

That is true, but we we might get there. We might. Yeah, yeah.

unknown 37:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:00

All right. Well, Hannah, cheers. Cheers. Happy anniversary. Happy anniversary.

unknown 38:07

All right.

SPEAKER_00 38:08

That's how we're ending with tuning in to Joint Effort PAs. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe, leave a review, and share it with a fellow PA or med minded friend. You can also follow us on Instagram at Joint EffortPAs for updates and extra content. See you next time.