Hello all,
I am a practicing PT in Wisconsin going on five years. I work in an outpatient hospital based facility as a salaried PT. I have seen a lot of changes over the past years basically it boils down to I go into work early, work through my lunch break doing notes, and leave late every day. I average about 48-50 hours per week and many of my salaried colleagues work 50+ hours a week. My current salary is in the upper $60K range but when you factor in the extra hours I really only make around $25.00 per hour considering all the extra time I am putting in- and I am one of the most efficient and productive therapists in my department I usually am 85-100% productive. It doesn't seem like the hourly PTs have it any better in the area as well as I have some colleagues who told me they are expected to clock out for 45 minutes or 1 hour if they have a patient that cancels and the office staff was unable to fill it which I think is ridiculous.
I take many short cuts with patient care and I even also stop 5-10 minutes early for each appointment in order to try and finish on time but when your employer gives you no paperwork time and writing or dictating progress/insurance/DC notes it is just too much to do in 40 hours with the amount of patients my employer expects you to see. Now I wouldn't care if I was making $90 or 100K a year but I am certainly not. It seems like the bottom line or employer expectation is see more patients, bill more, and keep trying to improve your productivity which is the main pressure that myself and many of my colleagues feel. If this is the norm I don't think I can handle this kind of work at full-time until I am able to retire!!! I will definitely burn out and more and more PTs I know are trying to decrease their hours as soon as they can.
I am curious to know what other PTs are seeing and what the students are seeing when they shadow various PTs. Maybe the expectations around here are different compared to other regions?
PTboy
I am a practicing PT in Wisconsin going on five years. I work in an outpatient hospital based facility as a salaried PT. I have seen a lot of changes over the past years basically it boils down to I go into work early, work through my lunch break doing notes, and leave late every day. I average about 48-50 hours per week and many of my salaried colleagues work 50+ hours a week. My current salary is in the upper $60K range but when you factor in the extra hours I really only make around $25.00 per hour considering all the extra time I am putting in- and I am one of the most efficient and productive therapists in my department I usually am 85-100% productive. It doesn't seem like the hourly PTs have it any better in the area as well as I have some colleagues who told me they are expected to clock out for 45 minutes or 1 hour if they have a patient that cancels and the office staff was unable to fill it which I think is ridiculous.
I take many short cuts with patient care and I even also stop 5-10 minutes early for each appointment in order to try and finish on time but when your employer gives you no paperwork time and writing or dictating progress/insurance/DC notes it is just too much to do in 40 hours with the amount of patients my employer expects you to see. Now I wouldn't care if I was making $90 or 100K a year but I am certainly not. It seems like the bottom line or employer expectation is see more patients, bill more, and keep trying to improve your productivity which is the main pressure that myself and many of my colleagues feel. If this is the norm I don't think I can handle this kind of work at full-time until I am able to retire!!! I will definitely burn out and more and more PTs I know are trying to decrease their hours as soon as they can.
I am curious to know what other PTs are seeing and what the students are seeing when they shadow various PTs. Maybe the expectations around here are different compared to other regions?
PTboy