BayCare Clinic doesn’t have many providers whose resumes read: “Sausage racer, Miller Park, Milwaukee Brewers.”
That, however, is how Colton Skenandore, a physician assistant with BayCare Clinic Emergency Physicians, got started.
“My first job ever when I was in high school, I worked for the Brew Crew for the Milwaukee Brewers,” he says. “Part of my job was actually running in the sausage races.”
No matter whether he was the Brat, Polish, Italian, Hot Dog or Chorizo, “that was fun,” Skenandore says. “Whoever won was legitimately the person that ran the fastest.”
A member of the Oneida Nation and a first-generation college student, Skenandore earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Skenandore’s mother managed a radiology department, sparking his interest in pursuing a medical career.
“I had an inkling that that’s what I wanted to go into, I just didn’t know in what aspects,” he says.
Skenandore became interested in emergency medicine while watching “Life in the ER,” a TV show featuring reenactments of emergency medicine situations.
That interest was solidified during many hours of volunteer work as an undergraduate.
“I volunteered in the emergency room at St. Mary’s Hospital in Madison,” he says. “Then I was a nursing assistant in the Trauma and Life Support Center at UW.”
He also volunteered in the University Hospital intensive care unit and at University Hospital’s Burn and Wound Center in Madison before attending physician assistant school at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health.
Skenandore joined BayCare Clinic in 2017. He enjoys the unpredictability of working as an emergency medicine PA.
“It keeps you on your toes. You have the potential to see really sick patients. You have the potential to see some people with minor abnormalities that need a little bit of care,” says Skenandore, who sees patients in Green Bay, Oshkosh and Two Rivers.
Physician assistants assist during surgical procedures, diagnose illnesses, order and interpret tests, prescribe medications and more. They’re supervised by a physician.
“Sometimes some people don’t have regular care, so you end up catching things that aren’t necessarily emergent but are maybe more chronic in nature and just have haven’t been followed, so you have to refer them to the right people to get taken care of,” he says.
Away from work, Skenandore enjoys spending time with his wife and children, running, hunting and fishing.