Salaries

[Idiopathic]

I know this may have been beaten to death, but here goes...

If I wanted to work at a busy ER, and didnt mind working 50-60 hours a week, what kind of income could I bring in? Is all ER work becoming hourly/shift work, or are there still ER physicians that are salaries. Does anyone have a good regional breakdown or anything that details this information? Thanks.

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[Apollyon]

If you're paid hourly, that can be anywhere from $90-150/hr. Math that out and that's some righteous bucks, and you can make a killing in EM - but the hours you'd have to work may kill YOU. 5 12hr shifts a week is like someone beating you with a hammer.

However, it seems like there are as many pay schemes as there are EP's. Some of these folks that know a LOT more than me will give their input.

 

[Idiopathic]

Anybody work 4 16's? We had one of our teaching faculty told us that he ended up doing something like 14-16 16-hour shifts a month...anyone else do this?

 

[southerndoc]

I know one EM doc that works 5 24-hour shifts/month. He usually does them as 24 on, 24 off for 10 days in a row and takes the other 20 days off.

 

[IlianaSedai]

Ever tried running a search on salary.com ? That breaks it down by region and specialty for you.

 

[Idiopathic]

I havent tried that. Thanks.

 

[raptor5]

Look on edphysicians.com
Has many job openings per state. Not all postings have the salary listed.

 

[drfredmd]

Working 8 hours is great, 12 worse and 24 can be terrible if you're up all day and night. Salaries are extremely variable - I work in rural america and make over $200/hour working 8 hour shifts. See about 1.7 patients per hour. No sense killing yourself - find a job that you like and go for longevity.

 

[shaggybill]

DrFredMD, do you work 5 days a week, like at a clinic, or is it in the ER working a couple of day shifts along with a few night shifts?

Also, I'd like to work in a rural area. Do you like it?

 

[drfredmd]

I work a standard rotating schedule in the ED, day, evening, nights.

One thing I have noticed with community small town medicine is that a lot of patients come to the ED after their family doc is stumped. Instead of siimply ensuring there is nothing "emergent" going on, I usually start the "major work-up" including MRI, etc. We also do a ton of out-patient work-ups - belly pain returning in 8 hours, u/s, ct followups, etc. Usually don't do a lot of this during residency.

 

[Sessamoid]

Salary.com has fairly accurate estimates, at least in the regions that I've worked in. Those numbers generally assume an average of what I'm guessing is 35-40 hours per week. It will be an average of whatever the physicians that they surveyed actually work, I suppose.

If I were working 5 12-hour shifts a week, I'd be ready to beat somebody with a hammer!

 

[Halaljello]

Working 8 hours is great, 12 worse and 24 can be terrible if you're up all day and night. Salaries are extremely variable - I work in rural america and make over $200/hour working 8 hour shifts. See about 1.7 patients per hour. No sense killing yourself - find a job that you like and go for longevity.

200 bucks an hour? woah, thats one of the highest i've seen...are you sure you're not stretching things a little? how "rural" is the place that you're practicing at?

 

[Sessamoid]

200 bucks an hour? woah, thats one of the highest i've seen...are you sure you're not stretching things a little? how "rural" is the place that you're practicing at?

$200 / hour is definitely the high end of things, but there are a few places in LA even where the docs pull in that much. Mind you, those jobs don't become available but once in a blue moon, and usually filled by somebody they already know.