Physician Compensation Rises 17% Since 2018 as Shortages Persist

Physician compensation is on the rise as healthcare organizations confront persistent clinician shortages and record levels of burnout.

The “Medscape Physician Compensation Report 2023” shows that physician compensation rose yet again, with the average physician salary growing from $299,000 in 2018 to $352,000 in this year’s report. That is an over 17 percent increase during the period and a 4 percent increase compared to last year’s average physician salary.

Meanwhile, the gender pay gap in healthcare closed a little for physicians. Women doctors in primary care earn 19 percent less than their male counterparts compared to 25 percent less in 2018. Women specialists make 36 percent less versus 31 percent in 2022.

Women primary care physicians earn an average of $239,000 in 2022 compared to $286,000 for male physicians. For specialists, men earn an average of $415,000 versus $327,000 for women.

The racial pay gap, however, did not budget, according to the report. African American and Black physicians continued to earn about 13 percent less than their White peers. Latinx and Hispanic physicians also make less than White physicians, on average.

“While there is more work to be done, the progress on gender pay disparities was a positive development in this year’s report,” Leslie Kane, MA, senior director of Medscape Business of Medicine, said in a press release. “That said, the issue of physician burnout, fueled by long hours and bureaucratic burdens, continues to have an impact on how physicians view their careers, their satisfaction with pay, and other aspects of medicine.”

Another Medscape report from earlier this year shows that physician burnout has worsened, with rates increasing to 53 percent this past year — that percentage up from 47 percent in 2021 and 26 percent in 2018. More than one in five physicians also said they had experienced depression since last year.

Burnout is a top factor contributing to physician shortages, along with other challenges of the job. Rules and regulations in healthcare, long hours at work, and difficult patients are some of the most challenging parts of a physician’s job, according to the Physician Compensation Report.

Overall, physicians spend 15.5 hours per week on paperwork and administration. Of that, 9 hours are on EHR documentation, the report states.

Among the specialties with the most paperwork are physical medicine and rehabilitation (19 hours), critical care (18 hours), internal medicine (18 hours), nephrology (18 hours), and neurology (18 hours). Family medicine physicians also spend an average of 17 hours per week on paperwork and administration.

Notably, these specialties are not among the top earning areas in this year’s report. Top earners based on average salary include plastic surgery ($619,000), orthopedics ($573,000), cardiology ($507,000), urology ($506,000), and gastroenterology ($501,000). Medscape said these top-earning specialties had been relatively the same over the last decade, except for plastic surgery, which started to rise to the top in 2017.

Among the lowest-compensated specialties are public health and preventative medicine ($249,000), pediatrics ($251,000), family medicine ($255,000), infectious diseases ($262,000), and diabetes and endocrinology ($267,000).