Based on this, do you think the avg. salary will increase?

[PREMEDWOAHS]

This is a segment from an article about the future employment options for DPT's....based on these facts do you think the salary will take a much needed increase by 2014, more towards what PT's deserve to make??

Advancement Possibilities and Employment Outlook

Experienced therapists can become supervisors of hospital departments. With additional education, they may teach physical therapy.

Employment of physical therapists is expected to grow much faster than the average for all occupations through 2014, largely because the population is growing older and likely to need rehabilitation and long-term care. Advances in therapeutic techniques, especially for trauma victims and newborns with birth defects, should create additional demand for rehabilitative care.

Although many people are training to become physical therapists, the supply of these workers is expected to fall short of demand. However, employment growth may be restricted by controls on health-care costs.

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[Heavenly4505]

This really doesn't indicate to me that salaries are going to increase. It just sounds like there will be a growing demand for people in the field. One plus of PT is that, unless you want to start up your own clinic, you don't have to worry about purchasing an establishment, hiring and training staff, paying everyone working for you, etc. that you do with other fields. However, as sad as it is, the low income figures are steering some people away from PT who would normally want to work in the field. The same with Audiology, SLP, OT, etc. I myself am considering a different field with more income potential.

 

[PREMEDWOAHS]

well usually when something is in high demand and there is low quantity, the cost to purchase it increases. thats the only reason i asked.

 

[bigdan]

Premed-

I think your theory is correct, but other factors also have influence here. Most importantly, what is the PT being paid to do? See a patient and then bill (the insurance company, usually) for service. You might indeed be in high demand, but how much can someone pay you if you are still gonna be reimbursed a fixed amount for the service provided?

I graduated school in 1998 (admittedly OT, not PT) there were jobs for new grads in the south for $80K/yr. Then our buddies in Washington dropped the ol' Balanced Budget Act in 1999; down goes the Medicare payment. Rehab salaries dropped. A lot. Like by 40%.

If you can somehow work for yourself for cash reimbursement, then cha-ching. If you work for someone else that has to pay other people - then it's tough to increase your salary. A tiny outpatient rehab outfit I worked for had about 60 employees at full size...maybe 20 of us were therapists that generated revenue. So all of us generated all the money that covered salaries, benefits, facility cost/overhead, etc for 60 people. It's very hard to increase pay when Medicare is only gonna pay a certain amount.

Or something like that...

dc

 

[DocWagner]

Pay has been relatively stagnant for 5-10 years if not longer. But so has most of health care, the problem is that the cost of a PT education has increased tremendously over this same time frame, without a equal jump in pay.

 

[PT2MD]

For Texas the salaries have increased. My first year salary was $43 to $45K. I just hired a new grad for ~$50-55K. That seems to be the going rate for outpatient in this area. 'Course you could work in a SNF or LTAC down in the valley and they will pay you the big bucks, but you have to be a special kind of person to last in that environment...and I'm not that special.

 

[DocWagner]

That is what I am saying...in 1995, I was paid $43k out of PT school in outpatient ortho...plus a $5k educational grant.

Pay has been stagnant, the field is growing, but pay is really slow to rise.

 

[PT2MD]

That is what I am saying...in 1995, I was paid $43k out of PT school in outpatient ortho...plus a $5k educational grant.

Pay has been stagnant, the field is growing, but pay is really slow to rise.

Hard to disagree as a whole. I moved pretty quickly from clinical to clincal and administrative and have seen my salary go up at a much better rate. I think staff therapists have had salary increases on the order of inflation over the last five years.