Primary Care Compensation: Incomes are Up, Job Satisfaction Not So Much
What does primary care compensation look like these days? Would you choose primary care all over again? Here: key highlights that shed light from a Medscape Physician Compensation Report.
More than 19,200 physicians in more than 27 specialties responded to the Medscape Physician Compensation Report 2017, which offers insights about primary care compensation and job satisfaction.
Annual salaries for all physicians increased to $294,000 in 2017, up from $206,000 in 2011. The steady increase in earnings is likely due to intense competition for doctors between hospitals and healthcare systems, as well as urgent care centers, federally qualified health centers, direct care, concierge care, and other delivery systems. However, internal medicine and family medicine physicians only showed a 1% increase in salary in 2017.
Physicians who earned the most money practiced in North Dakota ($361,000), Alaska ($359,000), and South Dakota ($354,000)-- perhaps due to federal government efforts to attract more physicians to rural and economically disadvantaged areas. Areas with the lowest average annual earnings: District of Columbia ($235,000), Maryland ($260,000), and Rhode Island and New Mexico (both $261,000). ©Forest Foxy/ Shutterstock.com
Male primary care physicians earned more than $30,000 more than their female counterparts: $229,000 for men as compared $197,000 for women. But this gap closed slightly this year to 16% from 17% last year. ©Lightspring/ Shutterstock.com
About half of primary care physicians said they felt they were fairly compensated: 53% of family medicine physicians and 49% of internal medicine physicians. But about half (46%) of primary care physicians said they should earn an additional 11% to 25%. ©Raywoo/ Shutterstock.com
About three-quarters of primary care physicians said they would choose medicine again as a career (77% FPs, 75% IMs). But when asked about their choice of specialty, primary care came out on the bottom of the list of all specialists: only 64% of IMs and 67% of FPs would choose primary care again.
Physician salaries were up for the seventh year in a row, according to Medscape's Physician Compensation Report 2017. More than 19,200 physicians across 27 specialties responded to that survey. Select highlights pertaining to primary care physicians follow.   Â