Salaries of doctors in Europe

[tmac71]

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Hello everyone!

I've been looking for some updated comparison of doctors' salaries in each of the European countries: Scandinavia (yep, I know it's not a country 😉), Germany, Holland, France and UK. I have problems with finding anything precise on the internet.

Sorry if it's not the right place to ask about it, I'm a new user.

Hope you could help me with a link or maybe you know the answer.

p.s Great forum! Congrats for all the users.

take care

M

 

[hamsterfeet]

Hello everyone!

I've been looking for some updated comparison of doctors' salaries in each of the European countries: Scandinavia (yep, I know it's not a country 😉), Germany, Holland, France and UK. I have problems with finding anything precise on the internet.

Sorry if it's not the right place to ask about it, I'm a new user.

Hope you could help me with a link or maybe you know the answer.

p.s Great forum! Congrats for all the users.

take care

M

The information you're giving is kind of broad, first of all what kind of doctor are you talking about? (not only that, but there are MANY factors that influence a doctor's salary, so you will have to be more specific than that in order to get an answer)

 

[tmac71]

Thank you Hamsterfeet for your reply.

I need a general info about salaries in EU depending on specialization and experience.

But to precise a bit more, I'm interested only in specialists salaries, let's say with 2 years experience.

If we could make it on the example of general medicine specialists, that would be great.

And to precise even more... 🙂 I'm working on a project for my University about Eastern European doctors working in different EU countries, but I'm sure the data can also be useful for other people on this forum later.

Thanks,

take care

M

 

[slight365]

Beware of the bloated salaries physicians and their unions will give you. They factor in a bloated amount for the benefits, so all of a sudden, it looks like a facharzt is taking in pre-tax 60, when in reality, it's 36-39, minus 46% for taxation, then minus about another 12-14% in German stealth taxation. The above is the case for Germany and why German physicians are leaving the moment they are done with school. The government acknowledges fairly horrid working conditions and subsistence salary, but is completely unwilling to do anything about it, as is the physicians unions.

 

[Singh]

As Hamsterfeet puts it, there are many factors to take into account when comparing physician salaries from country to country: Number of workhours, income tax, cost of living, insurances, working in private or state-sector, etc. For instance, Germany and UK have higher working hours than Scandinavia where you often work about 37-45 hours a week. Luckily in Scandinavia, we don't have the high insurance costs as in the US, but the cost of living is relatively high. Of course, you may work more than 37-45 hours if you wish to earn more. One extra hour will often give you 150% increase in salary, so if you work 10 extra hours a week, you will earn the equivalent of 15 hours on top of your normal salary.

Scandinavia generally enjoys an influx of physicians which indicates that it's more attractive to work here, perhaps due to better salary or fewer working hours.

 

[Sarah0]

I don't know about salaries of general medicine specialists, but I know there is some literature available about salaries of GP's in Europe.

Here you can read an article about: "Income development of General Practitioners in eight European countries from 1975 to 2005".
http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6963/9/26

They did some research about salaries in Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Finland, France, the Netherlands, Sweden and the United Kingdom.

Good luck with your project!

 

[slight365]

I can tell you this- German salaries have not significantly improved since 2005. There is a slight alteration, however, in that east German salaries were a % of west German ones for physicians until 2009, so that gives the false appearance of rising salaries for physicians as a whole. In fact, the physician's union, without consulting the physicians, agreed with the government to delay giving them full pay in east Germany until sometime afterward.

They are also not taking into account the actual work hours, not the declared contract hours. For physicians here, it's more of the game residents deal with in the US- work 80 hours for the same pay in many cases I've personally seen. Looking closely, I can see those are the BS numbers they use in Europe, where they inflate the income, but in the end, it's actual money income plus the value of the benefits. Germany's take home is not even close to those numbers, and highly and aggressively regulated through various means (including through taxation to discourage people from splitting 40 hours between different departments of practice). NL is one place Germans are going and no way is it making sense that their pays are lower than Germany when Germany has a net loss of physicians every year, which is going to hit crisis level if it hasn't already.

Too bad they didn't put Norway and Switzerland there- two locations taking in lots of German physicians who want to escape essentially horrific working conditions and little pay.

 

[Marsupilami]

Salaries for German residents are not that bad in comparison to other EU countries, especially if you keep in mind that cost of living isn't that high in Germany ( just try to rent an appartment for 300-400 Euro in Switzerland, Norway, UK or the Netherlands).

It's the working conditions/hours and the lack of structured education that drives a lot of junior doctors away from hospital jobs.

 

[Slechts1Leven]

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/15/how-much-do-doctors-in-other-countries-make/

According to this website doctors in the netherlands make an average of $252,000 a year for specialist and $117,000 for general practitioners. Is this the figure after taxes, because high income residents in netherlands get taxed 52%. So that would reduce the income of a specialist to $126,000 and $58,500 for general practitioners. Do you guys think the $252,000 or $126,00 s their income after or before taxes.

 

[tmac71]

thank you all for your help!

M

 

[slight365]

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/15/how-much-do-doctors-in-other-countries-make/

According to this website doctors in the netherlands make an average of $252,000 a year for specialist and $117,000 for general practitioners. Is this the figure after taxes, because high income residents in netherlands get taxed 52%. So that would reduce the income of a specialist to $126,000 and $58,500 for general practitioners. Do you guys think the $252,000 or $126,00 s their income after or before taxes.

Lol. Germany's ranking is pathetic. They should be embarrassed.

 

[tmac71]

It's data from 2004..

 

[slight365]

It's no better now for Germany, believe me. In fact, the comparative salaries have dropped for physicians in Germany.

 

[Medstart108]

You definitely see some German grads at US residencies so clearly there is a reason to flee.

 

[Kahreek]

salary in EU, maybe netherlands and uk are a bit better, are very low compared to USA, but you still will be in top tier income. The further souther you go the worse it becomes.

The norm is to work for an hospital, public or private, you have a set salary, regardless of the patients you see, you bill very few things or nothing at all, only way to gain more is to moonlight or make extra hours.
You pretty much are in to do resident schedule all your career.

 

[Medstart108]

salary in EU, maybe netherlands and uk are a bit better, are very low compared to USA, but you still will be in top tier income. The further souther you go the worse it becomes.

The norm is to work for an hospital, public or private, you have a set salary, regardless of the patients you see, you bill very few things or nothing at all, only way to gain more is to moonlight or make extra hours.
You pretty much are in to do resident schedule all your career.

For the UK, public sector (most doctors) will likely be making around 80,000 pounds a year.
Specialists who are consultants will make 90,000 base salary with a bonus of around 10,000.
GPs make around 60-80,000 a year.

Private sector physicians can have much higher pay especially for fields like cosmetic surgery in London, but again only the very best can become those physicians and the market is small. UK's NHS covers most things and the demand for uncovered procedures like cosmetic surgery is limited to mostly wealthy areas like NW London.

 

[Kahreek]

well then i guess it is the same as the rest of EU.
But 80k pounds is still better than german or france, where you can expect to earn half as much.

 

[Medstart108]

Sometimes i wonder why anyone would become a doctor at all for such a low salary. Certainly, it explains why most of the world's best research and discoveries happen in the Northern European countries, Japan or the English speaking countries.

Countries that continue to pay their doctors low salaries won't attract the smartest talent.

 

[galactica2001]

I naively thought that at least some people go into medicine, because they want to help sick people and not because they want to get rich. Silly me...

 

[Beargryllz]

I naively thought that at least some people go into medicine, because they want to help sick people and not because they want to get rich. Silly me...

Ridiculous

Why would anyone do that?

I don't do my job because I like it, I do my job because they pay me

 

[Medstart108]

I naively thought that at least some people go into medicine, because they want to help sick people and not because they want to get rich. Silly me...

You are seriously naive.

 

[dr.evergreen]

As Hamsterfeet puts it, there are many factors to take into account when comparing physician salaries from country to country: Number of workhours, income tax, cost of living, insurances, working in private or state-sector, etc. For instance, Germany and UK have higher working hours than Scandinavia where you often work about 37-45 hours a week. Luckily in Scandinavia, we don't have the high insurance costs as in the US, but the cost of living is relatively high. Of course, you may work more than 37-45 hours if you wish to earn more. One extra hour will often give you 150% increase in salary, so if you work 10 extra hours a week, you will earn the equivalent of 15 hours on top of your normal salary.

Scandinavia generally enjoys an influx of physicians which indicates that it's more attractive to work here, perhaps due to better salary or fewer working hours.

hello.. I am a 4th year medical student from the Philippines. I plan to do my internship here and take the Medical Licensure Exam and do residency training in other countries. Are there any opportunities to do residency training in Scandinavia for foreign physicians especially in internal medicine/cardiology or pediatrics? If there are, what are the requirements? Thanks 🙂