Category Archive: eResources

The Ultimate Guide to Physician Salaries

In light of the new Medscape Physician Compensation Report 2012 that was just released, I thought it was time to compile all the data on physician salaries into one place. There are many resources online that report average physician salaries, and many of them offer very different results. I recently wrote an article detailing the pros and the cons many of these online physician salary and compensation databases.  However, it can be a bit tedious to go through all the work of visiting each website to compare results.  So, I have done all the work for you. In this article I will present the physician salary by specialty data from all the reliable and relevant online physician salary databases.  Feel free to compare and contrast the information presented by each different company.

Medscape Physician Compensation Report

In my opinion, the Medscape average physician salary report is the most reliable data on the internet. It represents more than 20,000 physician surveys answered by doctors in every specialty in every part of the country. See my article about the 2012 Medscape report to learn about all the great information they report in their results.

 

Careers In Medicine: Specialty Pages

Careers in Medicine (CiM) is a great resource for medical students and medical residents (link to my previous article about Careers in medicine). One of the greatest tools it provides is a list of salary information for each specialty.  Careers in Medicine separates the compensation information using two very important distinctions: academic vs. private practice and starting salaries vs. established salaries.  CiM obtains the academic salary information from the Association of American Medical Colleges AAMC Report on Medical School Faculty Salaries. The data about private practice salaries comes from the MGMA Physician Compensation Survey.  Below, I have compiled a table of the salaries reported for each specialty. (Click here to download the formatted table) On the CiM website you can also see salary data for every sub-specialty; this is especially important for internal medicine, pediatrics, and general surgery where the sub-specialty choice results in very different salaries.

Compiled from the Careers in Medicine website, AAMC

 

Allied Physicians: Old Salary Survey

Many students use the alliedphysicians.com resource to learn about physician salaries by specialty. However, you should know that it has not been updated since 2006, so the information is likely a bit off now but the trends are still the same.

From alliedphysicians.com

 

Cejka Search

The Cejka Search Group is a great resource for salary information but also for job openings and employment information. Their physician salary survey is up-to-date and updated frequently. They freely publish their salary information in order to advertise the many physician job openings they have available.

Physician Specialty

Median Physician Compensation Data

Allergy & Immunology

$249,674

Anesthesiology

$370,500

Cardiac & Thoracic Surgery

$533,084

Cardiology

$402,000

Colon & Rectal Surgery

$394,723

Critical Care Medicine

$264,750

Dermatology

$375,176

Diagnostic Radiology – Interventional

$478,000

Diagnostic Radiology – Non-Interventional

$454,205

Emergency Care

$267,293

Endocrinology

$218,855

Family Medicine

$208,861

Family Medicine – with Obstetrics

$209,565

Gastroenterology

$405,000

General Surgery

$357,091

Geriatrics

$187,602

Gynecological Oncology

$413,500

Gynecology

$232,075

Gynecology & Obstetrics

$275,152

Hematology & Medical Oncology

$320,907

Hospitalist

$215,716

Hypertension & Nephrology

$259,677

Infectious Disease

$227,750

Intensivist

$313,152

Internal Medicine

$214,307

Neonatology

$280,771

Neurological Surgery

$592,811

Neurology

$236,500

Nuclear Medicine (M.D. only)

$331,000

Obstetrics

$275,152

Occupational / Environmental Medicine

$223,750

Ophthalmology

$238,200

Oral Surgery

$380,500

Orthopedic Surgery

$500,672

Orthopedic Surgery – Hand

$476,039

Orthopedic Surgery – Joint Replacement

$605,953

Orthopedic Surgery – Pediatrics

$425,000

Orthopedic Surgery – Spine

$688,503

Orthopedic-Medical

$297,348

Otolaryngology

$368,777

Pathology (M.D. only)

$354,750

Pediatric Allergy

$198,458

Pediatric Cardiology

$233,958

Pediatric Endocrinology

$187,957

Pediatric Gastroenterology

$240,895

Pediatric Hematology / Oncology

$212,577

Pediatric Infectious Disease

$209,680

Pediatric Intensive Care

$272,000

Pediatric Nephrology

$198,686

Pediatric Neurology

$219,561

Pediatric Pulmonary Disease

$201,841

Pediatric Surgery

$419,783

Pediatrics & Adolescent

$209,873

Perinatology

$394,121

Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation

$237,628

Plastic & Reconstructive Surgery

$390,142

Psychiatry

$214,740

Psychiatry – Child

$216,360

Pulmonary Disease

$306,829

Radiation Therapy (M.D. only)

$447,250

Reproductive Endocrinology

$317,312

Rheumatologic Disease

$224,000

Sports Medicine

$231,540

Transplant Surgery – Kidney

$365,125

Transplant Surgery – Liver

$454,287

Trauma Surgery

$424,555

Urgent Care

$222,920

Urology

$413,941

Vascular Surgery

$413,629

Profiles Database Physician Salary Data

Profilesdatabase.com is another online physician recruitment company. They also publish their physician salary data freely in order to publicize their many job openings. Like the Cejka Search, these numbers are updated frequently and seem to be very reliable.

Specialty

National Average, Six Years in Practice

Median Starting Range

Allergy & Immunology

$246,000.00

$190,000.00

Anesthesiology

$360,000.00

$265,000.00

Cardiac & Thoracic Surgery

$522,875.00

$360,000.00

Cardiology

$402,000.00

$272,000.00

Colon& Rectal Surgery

$389,700.00

$290,000.00

Critical Care Medicine

$258,750.00

$198,000.00

Dermatology

$365,450.00

$234,000.00

Diagnostic Radiology – Interventional

$469,800.00

$335,000.00

Diagnostic Radiology – Non-Interventional

$444,850.00

$330,000.00

Endocrinology

$214,550.00

$165,000.00

Family Medicine

$199,850.00

$138,000.00

Family Medicine – with Obstetrics

$207,900.00

$142,000.00

Gastroenterology

$398,800.00

$272,000.00

General Surgery

$350,000.00

$225,000.00

Gynecological Oncology

$402,000.00

$300,000.00

Gynecology

$233,000.00

$210,000.00

Gynecology & Obstetrics

$279,750.00

$200,000.00

Hematology & Medical Oncology

$314,800.00

$222,000.00

Hospitalist

$210,950.00

$165,000.00

Nephrology

$252,000.00

$180,000.00

Infectious Disease

$225,000.00

$158,000.00

Internal Medicine

$208,790.00

$145,000.00

Neonatology

$275,400.00

$196,000.00

Neurological Surgery

$589,500.00

$395,000.00

Neurology

$237,000.00

$190,000.00

Ophthalmology

$248,000.00

$210,000.00

Orthopedic Surgery

$485,500.00

$315,000.00

Orthopedic Surgery – Pediatrics

$395,420.00

$318,000.00

Orthopedic Surgery – Spine

$625,000.00

$465,000.00

Otolaryngology

$350,000.00

$222,000.00

Pediatric Cardiology

$230,900.00

$189,000.00

Pediatric Endocrinology

$187,600.00

$170,000.00

Pediatric Gastroenterology

$230,500.00

$175,000.00

Pediatric Hematology / Oncology

$210,000.00

$175,000.00

Pediatric Infectious Disease

$205,00.00

$173,000.00

Pediatric Intensive Care

$252,500.00

$195,000.00

Pediatric Nephrology

$196,000.00

$172,000.00

Pediatric Neurology

$218,200.00

$182,000.00

Pediatric Pulmonary Disease

$190,000.00

$162,000.00

Pediatric Surgery

$401,000.00

$295,000.00

Pediatrics

$202,500.00

$162,000.00

Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation

$233,300.00

$178,000.00

Plastic  Surgery

$382,000.00

$273,000.00

Psychiatry

$211,000.00

$165,000.00

Psychiatry – Child

$218,300.00

$159,000.00

Pulmonary Disease

$298,000.00

$191,500.00

Rheumatology

$220,500.00

$163,500.00

Trauma Surgery

$400,000.00

$298,000.00

Urgent Care

$215,000.00

$142,000.00

Urology

$400,000.00

$250,000.00

Vascular Surgery

$405,000.00

$259,400.00

Merritt Hawkins: Physician Salary By Specialty

Merritt Hawkins is a physician salary survey that reports the average starting salary offered to new residency graduates.  The entire report for the year 2011 is available for free in PDF (click here). Remember, because these data represent new hires, the are STARTING SALARIES and should be compared to other reports accordingly. I will reprint the starting salaries of the 20 most highly recruited specialties below. The Merritt Hawkins PDF also reports the average signing bonus and average income guarantees. (If you are interested, I discuss the Merritt Hawkins report on the salaries of allied health professionals in another post)

 

From Merritt Hawkins Free PDF

 

The Medscape Physician Compensation Report, 2012

Each year Medscape conducts a nationwide study of physician salaries and compensation.  Medscape is surely one of the best online resources for researching physician salaries.  (See my article here about all the different online resources, databases, and surveys regarding physician salaries)  The data are a combination of over 20,000 surveys completed by physicians of every specialty all over the country.  The results for 2012 were published in late April. To compare the results of the Medscape Physician Compensation Report to the other well-known online survey results, check out my ‘Ultimate Guide to Physician Salaries‘ where you can compare all the available resources.

Results: Physician Salary by Specialty

Radiology and orthopedics are again the big money winners, bringing home an average salary of $315,000.  Family medicine and pediatrics earn the smallest salaries of all physicians at less than $160,000 a piece.

Taken from medscape.com

 

To see the full results, go to http://www.medscape.com/sites/public/physician-comp/2012.  You will need to obtain a FREE username and password, but the information is well worth the 10 seconds that will take.

 

Results: Physician Salary by Location

The Medscape survey also sheds light on some very interesting questions like ‘where in the US do physicians earn the most money?’  As you can see by the medscape graphic below, the average physician salary is nearly equal in all parts of the country. This is not the case in each specialty, but overall, there is no large difference.

Taken from medscape.com

 

Results: Changes in Salary since 2010

Medscape compares the average salary by specialty in 2012 to the same averages seen in 2010. The resulting data shed some light on the changes in physician salaries over the past couple years.  As you can see in the graphic below, ophthalmologists have enjoyed the largest increase in salary over the past two years while radiologists, orthopedists, and general surgeons have suffered the largest decline in wage.   The increase in ophthalmology compensation is interesting as they were the specialty that suffered the largest decline in salary between 2000 and 2010.  What we learn from this graph is simple: those that earn the most are the the greatest risk of declining salaries. This is because those who decide how much we all get reimbursed (i.e. Medicare and Medicaid bosses) will always go after those that are earning the most money. This is exactly what is happening right now to radiology and orthopedics, and is exactly what happened to ophthalmology 10 years ago.

From medscape.com

Results: Hours, Lifestyle, Satisfaction

In addition to salary information, the Medscape compensation report also details the number of hours worked in a week, the number of patients seen in a week, how satisfied doctors are with their specialty of choice, and many other questions.  Each of these questions is divided up by specialties so we can compare the results between specialties.

Again, here is the link to the main Medscape Physician Compensation Report
http://www.medscape.com/sites/public/physician-comp/2012

Also, medscape provides a detailed report for each specialty including the above data: salary, hours, lifestyle, satisfaction, etc. Click on the specialty below to be taken to the individual report. [LOGIN REQUIRED]


 

Is the Patient’s Device Safe for MRI?

MRIsatety.com is a great resource for medical students, residents, and all medical personnel.  We all know that when a patient has a pacemaker from 2004 that they can not get a thoracic MRI. However, what if the patient had a recent shoulder replacement? What if the patient has a port for chemotherapy? What if the patient had recent spinal surgery? No matter what the circumstance, you can search this website for the patient’s device and find out if it is safe for an MRI.

The main website is…
http://www.mrisafety.com

Or, the searchable list of implantable devices can be found directly at…
http://www.mrisafety.com/list_search.asp

The list of all searchable products includes:

  • Pumps
  • Aneurysm clips
  • Bone and Nerve stimulators
  • Cardiac Pacemakers and AICDs (defibrillators)
  • Breast and other soft tissue implants
  • Coils, Filters, Stents, Grafts
  • Dental Implants and Devices
  • Catheters
  • Clips
  • Foreign Bodies
  • Ocular Implants, lens
  • Sutures
  • Etc.

 

American College of Radiology: Appropriateness Criteria

Have you ever wondered what imaging test should be ordered for your patient? What radiologic test would be most beneficial in this situation? What imaging test should I order first? If a patient comes in with a painful knee, should I get an x-ray or go straight to MRI?  If a woman comes in with a non-tender breast mass should I get an ultrasound before the mammogram?  These are difficult questions; luckily The American College of Radiology (ACR) has our back! The ACR publishes a fantastic online resource they call the “Appropriateness Criteria” which details the best imaging tests for nearly every presentation.

http://www.acr.org/ac

They website allows the user to choose between a variety of organ systems (e.g. women’s health, urology, gastrointestinal).  In each organ system the user can then choose a specific complaint (e.g. breast mass, hematuria, dysphagia). For each complaint, the ACR then allows the user to choose what specific patient presentation is occuring (e.g. 35 year old woman with a new breast mass vs. 35 year old woman with a mass seen on mammogram vs. 70 year old woman with a new breast mass). In each circumstance, the ‘Appropriateness Criteria” explains what is the best radiologic test to help diagnose the patient’s problem.  They explain in detail the advantages and disadvantages of each test (MRI, CT scan, ultrasound, x-ray, etc) for each specific problem.

The criteria are updated every few years, the most recent data comes from 2009. One of the best parts about the ACR Appropriateness Criteria can be found at the end of each section. Not only do they make suggestions about which tests will be most useful in diagnosis, they also provide a literature review for EVERY SINGLE patient complaint which outlines what research and studies they are using when making their suggestions.

I HIGHLY RECOMMEND this website. In fact, there are few resources that I can recommend higher. I have used this many times and they intricacies and precision of the criteria still surprise me.  There is NO BETTER RESOURCE available to determine which imaging tests are indicated for a specific patient presentation.

 

Dealoz: Textbook Price Comparison

Throughout college and medical school I had to buy thousands of dollars worth of textbooks. During my first year of medical school I came across the world’s best textbook website: http://www.dealoz.com/.  DealOz allows you to search all available websites, auction sites, book stores, and online sites for the textbook you are looking for. All you need is a title or IBSN and DealOz will do the rest of the work.  If you have every used www.kayak.com for flight tickets, DealOz works the same way by comparing all available options.

After inputting the book of choice, DealOz will compare all of these locations and report back to you the lowest price available. You can search for all available books, or you can choose to search only for ‘new’ books. DealOz will then link you to your seller of choice.  Try it, you will like it. I have saved hundreds of dollars using their website.

Again, here it is

http://www.dealoz.com/

Internet based paging system

howstuffworks.com

If you need to send numeric or text pages to medical students, residents, or attendings Telepage Web Pager is the best website. Most hospitals have a built in method to text page anyone with a hospital affiliation. However, this web based paging system allows you to page anything you want to any pager in the country.  Try it, it’s free!

http://www.telepagewebpager.us/

The Best Free Software For Students

If you are anything like me, you will do anything to avoid paying thousands of dollars for the next Adobe product.  After ten years of higher education (and at least 4 to go!) I have tested hundreds of software packages; in this post I will list the best free and open source programs I have found.  Learn to love open source software…and you will soon learn how to spend those thousands of dollars you saved!  My software list will certainly not be a comprehensive list of all the great open source programs. For a complete list of free software programs I have three recommendations.

  • The best resource is sourceforge.net which is a nearly complete collection of all reputable free software.
  • FileHippo.com is a free website that lists hundreds of free software packages by category
  • schoolforge.net is a compilation of hundreds of free and open source software programs that is easily searchable.

 

WEB BROWSER

Google Chrome is a no-nonsense, super fast web browser.  Here is just one reference proving Chrome's speed superiority (from cnet.com). For mac users, Safari is a distant second.  While I used to enjoy Firefox, it takes nearly twice as long to load web pages than Chrome.  We all know how terrible Internet Explorer is.

 

WORD PROCESSING, PRESENTATIONS, SPREADSHEETS

OpenOffice is a well known counterpart to Microsoft Office.  The free software includes a fully capable word processor, a presentation organizer, and a fully loaded spreadsheet tool.  In essence, you get Word, PowerPoint, and Excel for free.  An added bonus, you can save any file in OpenOffice format OR in the corresponding Microsoft format so there will never be compatibility issues.

 

CALENDAR

My love for Google products will now show through.  Google Calendar is simple and highly effective.  You can merge nearly all online calendars into your Google calendar account. You can send yourself reminders using email, phone call, or text message. You can list recurring events in any imaginable patter (e.g. same date each year, 2nd Saturday of March each year, etc.)

 

IMAGE MANIPULATION / GRAPHIC EDITOR

1. Gimp is a professional image editor with a student's pricetag.  This free program comes with nearly all the bells and whistles you would find in the newest version of Adobe Photoshop.  The user interface is not idea and takes some getting used to. However, with a price tag of $0 this is a great piece of software.

 

2. I have heard great things about Paint.Net.  I must admit, I have never used it because I have spent so much time using Gimp that I don't need anything else.  However, it is worth a try if you are looking for more free graphic editing options.

 

AUDIO EDITOR

Audacity is a free, open-source program that facilitates the recording and editing of all audio and sound files.  I often use it to make my own 'radio edited' song versions.

 

PDF READER AND WRITER

Foxit Reader is far better than the free Adobe Reader. It requires far less resources when it is running on your computer, and it provides free mark-up tools including text editing, highlighting, commenting, and basic geometric shapes.

 

PDF CREATOR / CONVERTER

CutePDF Writer is the free version of CutePDFs vast line of products. The free writer allows you to convert any image, document, or screen shot to a PDF.  I use this product all the time. I save documents as PDFs and place them on my thumb drive rather than printing everything out.

 

ANTIVIRUS SOFTWARE

There are actually quite a few free antivirus options out there. Many of the web giants (Google, Yahoo, MSN, etc) have their own free antivirus software. My personal favorite is Avast!, which the program that comes with GooglePak.  Just be sure you click on the FREE version, as they have other options.

 

PERSONAL FINANCE

Mint.com allows users to track all bank accounts, credit cards, loans, and investments in one place. The software is similar to costly software like Quicken, but is free and is web-based: which means you can check your information on any computer, any time.

 

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY, CITATIONS, REFERENCE MANGER

The best resource in this category, I must admit, is not free. EndNote is a must-have resource for research and reports. It is user friendly and will save you hours of time by automatically plugging in your references and bibliography. There are a number of free programs that try to mimic EndNote's features. Some are good, but after trying them I ended up purchasing a student edition of EndNote because it is so much better.  Here is a list of free bibliography and reference managers. Or you can check out the wikipedia page which compares all reference managers, free and non-free.

 

STATISTICAL ANALYSIS

R (The R Project for Statistical Computation) is a free text-based statistical computational software program.  It is not for the feint-hearted. The learning curve is steep, but once mastered, this free software provides all the tools to run any statistical analysis, graph, or plot.

 

LaTeX EDITOR

Not all LaTeX editors are created equal.  WinEdt is a clean editor without the frills of other programs. I have used this software for 5 years and I have never had even one problem (something that can NOT be said about most LaTeX editors!)  The free version will frequently ask the operator to purchase the full version, but it is never required.

 

BRAINSTORMING AND MIND MAPPING

XMind assists individuals and teams in keeping track of ideas and goals. If you have never used mind-mapping software, you need to start. XMind creates the prettiest visual map, but there are other options that work just as well. FreeMind is another great one.

 

 

Did I forget something? If you know of more great, open source software please leave a comment.

How to instrument tie: A video tutorial

jpatrick.net

In recent posts I highlighted some great training videos on suturing and on one and two handed knot tying. In this post I will recommend a video tutorial for instrument tying.  As with the other suturing and knot tying skills, it is very important that medical students learn early in their careers how to instrument tie.  This is the bread and butter of knot tying.  If you are proficient with the instrument tie you will impress residents and attendings and they will be much more willing to give you responsibilities in the OR.  The video below is a straight forward review and tutorial of the instrument tie.  As with all other knots, remember that a square knot is not complete until you have made two opposing throws; otherwise you are tying granny knots.

One and two handed surgical knot tying: A video tutorial

In two recent posts I recommended some great video tutorials for suturing and for instrument tying.  This post will focus on learning how to tie one and two handed knots in the operating room.  As with previous skills, it is very important that medical students learn to tie surgical knots early in their training.  Let me offer one experience from medical school to illustrate this fact.  This is a true story.

After finishing rounds with the residents on my OB rotation I was assigned to work in the OR with the chief of benign gynecology surgery at a community hospital.  He also happened to be the rotation coordinator and was responsible for my grade and evaluation.  The first case was an open tubal ligation. As the case was ending the attending turned to me and said, “hey, we have to close the fascia, can you tie knots?”  Luckily, I knew quite well how to tie.  I picked up the suture and threw a few two handed knots down.  My attending was seriously impressed and told everyone on the team.  He gave me a raving evaluation and spoke specifically about how I was “well prepared for the OR.” So, take it from me, learn these knots! Always remember Rule #1: tie square knots, not granny knots! Two throws are required to complete the knot. 

1. The two handed knot.  This is the knot that you will actually use in the OR. Most surgeons never tie one-handed knots and some even forbid them.  So, this should be your bread and butter. After watching a few tutorial videos I am convinced that this is the best.  It comes from the University of Texas at Houston and walks you through the basics. The audio is very good, so find some earphones. Always remember that a square not requires two throws to be completed.

2. The one handed knot: This is a more confusing knot and far less high yield because very few surgeons ever use it or expect it.  It is notoriously difficult to teach and to learn.  The best video I have found is shown below.  Unlike the previous video, there is not audio to walk you through the knot.  Rather, the knot is completed slowly and each difficult section is repeated.  Remember, you must tie two throws to make a complete square knot. This is important when tying a one handed knot because the two throws are completed using two different techniques.

Finally, there is more than one way to tie a square knot.  Here is one more video that demonstrates the two handed and one handed method clearly. Similar to the second video, there is no audio.  Go get some gloves and some suture and practice along with this video.

Histology Websites

Image from "Ed's Histology Review"

Histology is an extremely important topic during medical school, both in the pre-clinical years as you study anatomy and pathology, and during the clinical years when you are diagnosing patients. Many questions during school, including all three parts of the USMLE or COMLEX test will include histologic slides and ask for diagnosis or interpretation.  It is imperative that all medical students get a solid foundation in histology.  Years ago, most student would purchase histology textbooks.  However, recently, a number of medical schools have created free and easy-to-use websites for studying histology.  If you are still a book person, let me suggest Histology: A Text and Atlas which has great slides and explanations.  Otherwise, if you are like me and would like to save the money, let me outline some of the best histology review sites on the internet.

If you don’t want to spend the money and don’t mind using websites to study, let me recommend two fantastic  histology websites

If you know of other great websites, please let me know.

 

Older posts «