Medical director of ER stipend

[miamidoc101]

For those of you who are medical directors of your ER, what is your monthly stipend and what is the volume of your ER including freestandings?

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[Zebra Hunter]

For our group, our main campus director makes $85k/yr (65k visits/yr), freestanding directors make $20k/yr.

 

[AlmostAnMD]

My old shop directors made $140k and assistants 40k. Also had director bonuses, what they amounted to I'm unsure but were like a separate profit sharing check.

But also the group was corrupt and is experiencing high turnover so maybe be suspicious of very high rates.

 

[CajunMedic]

Small community shop with 15K visits a year, I get 20K spread out over a year

 

[Janders]

variable depending on volume, demands, support, and hospital support.

I think anything from 0.1FTE (for a truly remote, minimal effort shop) to 0.5FTE (multiple days of meetings a week, expectation for 24/7/365 access) are reasonable in community EDs.

 

[Pudortu]

Stipends can widely vary as can responsibilities. You can be expected to have to cover any open shifts (if laid out in contract) or have to do the schedule or expected to be there M-F during business hours except when working clinically. You can also have upside to your stipend as well as downside to a stipend (depending on volume, metrics, patient experience etc.) So much varies in the director stipend.

I've seen ranges from 4.5k/month to 17k/month. So much depends on how much is expected/demand/how much of a cluster it is.

 

[Porfirio]

Monthly:
5k very little work
10k normal amount of work
15k lots of work

+\- 2k for difficulty of hospital setting

 

[oldtown]

Disclaimer: It’s been about 7 years since I did one of these gigs. The (very large) group I was with structured the director stipend to be a percentage of collections for the site.

For my site (35k volume, ≈40th percentile in terms of payer mix) the monthly stipend was typically somewhere between $11k and $14k. Directors in our group at higher volume and/or better payer mix sites would often pull in $30k + monthly.

A lot was expected, and it’s a thankless job. I think $18k monthly is the absolute minimum I would require to do it again, and that would have to be at a well functioning site that is not difficult to recruit to.

 

[Zebra Hunter]

Disclaimer: It’s been about 7 years since I did one of these gigs. The (very large) group I was with structured the director stipend to be a percentage of collections for the site.

For my site (35k volume, ≈40th percentile in terms of payer mix) the monthly stipend was typically somewhere between $11k and $14k. Directors in our group at higher volume and/or better payer mix sites would often pull in $30k + monthly.

A lot was expected, and it’s a thankless job. I think $18k monthly is the absolute minimum I would require to do it again, and that would have to be at a well functioning site that is not difficult to recruit to.

I dunno, I think I could put up with the hassle of the job pretty well if I was getting paid $400k/yr for admin duties. You could basically cut down to 6 shifts/mo and likely be making around $600k/yr.

 

[HoosierdaddyO]

For my dept Medical Directors out there… what is the average numbers of hours that they have you doing admin work/meetings etc each week. And how does that correlate not so much with stipend but how many shifts they are requiring you to work.

Ie if they are requiring you to be in the office 4-5 days a week doing admin items… what’s the standard # of shifts that make sense to be working with that high level of admin involvement?

 

[Groove]

Stipends I've been aware of in my area over my career, all CMGs:

AFMD for 35-40K ~ 4k/mo
AFMD for 20-25K ~ 2-2.5K/mo
FMD for 35-50K ~ 10-16K/mo
FMD for FSED ~ 2k/mo

 

[Janders]

For my dept Medical Directors out there… what is the average numbers of hours that they have you doing admin work/meetings etc each week. And how does that correlate not so much with stipend but how many shifts they are requiring you to work.

Ie if they are requiring you to be in the office 4-5 days a week doing admin items… what’s the standard # of shifts that make sense to be working with that high level of admin involvement?

It’s just… highly variable. I probably do 20/hr a week but some weeks much much more. We get highly involved with throughput when the hospital is at capacity with a ton of adhoc meetings multiple hours a day.

Thankfully with zoom/teams I don’t have to come in for every 1hr meeting. I find my calender is frequently 1hr meeting at 0700. 1hr meeting at 11a. Clinical from noon-10p. Since I can do many of the meetings from home I can workout between them, do some chores, get the non-meeting admin work done, or even do hobby stuff. I was about to quit when the expectation was to be on site but with tons of dead time between in person meetings.

Technically my stipend and my clinical shift count are independant variables. By which I mean I could take my stipend and still work 16 shifts a month if I wanted, or take my stipend and only work 10.

 

[gutonc]

Chiming in from the (non-EM) cheap seats to comment on time commitment, not compensation.

When I was a medical director of an oncology group (5 offices, ~15 docs, covering 7 hospitals across 3 different hospital systems), when things were going smoothly, I would have maybe 3-4 hours a week of admin stuff to do. When things were not going well (which was the more common scenario) that would be 15-20 hours. Obviously a very different management situation but supports the notion that sometimes the pay you get for it is "worth it" and often it is not.

 

[DocEspana]

hopefully this isnt taboo of me to say because I'm not the director but I know the numbers. There is a little pocket of 1 mid-size trauma center, 1 critical access hospital, and 1 freestanding. Has a single director for all 3. total director compensation is $240,000, which sounds awesome but any assistant director stipends comes out of that extra $240k. Classically they've had 2 assistant directors.

 

[EctopicFetus]

hopefully this isnt taboo of me to say because I'm not the director but I know the numbers. There is a little pocket of 1 mid-size trauma center, 1 critical access hospital, and 1 freestanding. Has a single director for all 3. total director compensation is $240,000, which sounds awesome but any assistant director stipends comes out of that extra $240k. Classically they've had 2 assistant directors.

I think so much varies based on what the job entails. Some medical directors do very little. Some do a lot. Regardless of the size the work asked of the directors can significantly vary which is what makes answering this so hard. Talking to an HCA director their stipends vary but can go up to 20k a month. I would also argue the pay for the role depends on the amount of money you are giving up to do it. If you make 150/hr the stipend will be less than someone who works clinically and makes 325/hr.

 

[miamidoc101]

17k a month stipend seem reasonable? base + rvu for clinical averages low to mid 300s

 

[Pudortu]

17k a month stipend seem reasonable? base + rvu for clinical averages low to mid 300s

What are your responsibilities?
Also hope you mean per hour pay (which tends to plummet once you are director because everyone comes to you on shift with their problems)

 

[miamidoc101]

per hour pay, and the typical med director stuff, metrics/meeting with c suite, hiring new people, etc

 

[Pudortu]

per hour pay, and the typical med director stuff, metrics/meeting with c suite, hiring new people, etc

Without knowing the site, I feel like it's pretty reasonable.

You should dictate your own schedule but never offer to make the schedule (I'd quit immediately if I had to do that). You will have to find the right balance of directorship/clinical medicine/home life balance. Definitely have to cut back on shifts. I was working 14-16 12s routinely before directorship and can do 10/month now. Everyone will want some of your time even while working clinically. It gets annoying when you are on RVU. I've come out of a code before and an admin wants to ask me about something.

You will realize that you are never "off" and you have to be able to answer your phone in the middle of the night. It's something I still hate as being "off" is one of the best things about our specialty. Also, you will see your friends and colleagues in a whole new light. You will realize that some of them aren't the best docs and whine over the smallest things. You will see a lot of ugly.

Also, someone told me a long time ago that the average ER Medical director lasts only 2 years. Not sure how valid it is. It's a different type of grind.

PM me if you want to chat.