Physician Starting Salaries, Demand Rebounded from COVID-19 Lows

Physician starting salaries have rebounded from the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, with orthopedic surgeons being offered the highest average starting salary of $565,000, according to a report from AMN Healthcare and Merritt Hawkins.

The 2022 Review of Physician and Advanced Practitioner Recruiting Incentives is based on nearly 2,700 permanent physician and advanced practitioner search engagements that Merritt Hawkins/AMN Healthcare’s physician staffing companies conducted between April 1, 2021, and March 31, 2022.

Among the top 20 recruited specialists, interventional cardiologists ranked second in starting salary despite seeing a 16 percent year-over-year decrease. The starting salary for the specialty went from $611,000 in the 2020/2021 period to $527,000 in the 2021/2022 period.

Other specialties, including orthopedic surgeons, saw increases in starting salaries. For example, radiologists went from $401,000 to $455,000 and gastroenterologists went from $453,000 to $474,000. Urologists were offered an average starting salary of $510,000 in 2021/2022, up from $497,000 the year before.

Neurologists, pulmonologists, anesthesiologists, and obstetricians/gynecologists also saw starting salary increases in 2021 and 2022.

Meanwhile, pediatricians had the lowest average starting salary among physicians at $232,000, which was 2 percent lower than the year before ($236,000).

Aside from physicians, nurse practitioners ($138,000) and certified registered nurse anesthetists (CRNAs) ($211,000) also saw low average starting salaries. Nurse practitioners saw a 1 percent year-over-year decrease, while CRNAs saw a 5 percent decrease.

The majority of search engagements (92 percent) offered signing bonuses, the report found. The average signing bonus for physicians was $31,000 compared to $29,656 last year. The average signing bonus for nurse practitioners and physician assistants was $9,000, up from $7,233 last year.

Demand for physicians and starting salaries have rebounded from the pandemic’s peak as patients resumed seeking the healthcare they forwent during 2020. In addition, an aging population and widespread chronic medical conditions have increased physician demand.

Nurse practitioners were the most requested providers for the second consecutive year, the report found. This highlights a shift from traditional physician office-based primary care settings to settings like urgent care centers, retail clinics, and telehealth visits, researchers said.

Family physicians ranked second, followed by radiologists, psychiatrists, and OBGYNs rounding out the top five.

However, the demand for primary care physicians fell slightly compared to last year, while the need for other medical specialists rose.

“The market has done a complete about-face,” Tom Florence, president of physician permanent placement for AMN Healthcare, said in a press release. “Several years ago, primary care physicians were the priority for most hospitals and medical groups. While many still seek them, the emphasis has shifted to specialists.”

The increased demand for physician specialists likely reflects the needs of an aging population reliant on specialty care, the researchers noted. The high demand for radiologists is a sign that diagnostic services and procedures requiring imaging have bounced back from the peak of the pandemic.

Psychiatrists are likely in high demand due to the behavioral healthcare provider shortage that has been exacerbated during the pandemic, coupled with the heightened need for mental and behavioral healthcare services.

The report also found that the demand for telemedicine physicians grew, specifically for radiology and psychiatry.

In addition to most physicians seeing higher average starting salaries, physician compensation and productivity increased in 2021, a report from the American Medical Group Association (AMGA) found.

Median provider compensation increased by 3.7 percent from 2020 to 2021, while productivity increased by 18.3 percent.