<p>parent56 - Of course this model I referenced doesn’t apply to hospital care. For example, he has pre-negotiated a rate for things such as stress tests. Specialist care would, for a large part be self insured, up to a deductible for those patient who choose such a model. For your H, he would be accepting self-pay and insurance iike always. </p>
<p>Of course, you and I know that the doctor is the last of the bills and individual pays.</p>
<p>“The high salary is due to the high risk and specialized skill. It’s not because physicians go to school for 10-12 years”</p>
<p>-The high salary is due primary to the high student loans and Malpractice insurance. And most physicians go to school for about 8 years, then they are paid while in residency. They do NOT go to school for 10-12 years, even those who choose MD/PhD. While some (all?) MD/PhD is 8 years, they are normally supported by stipend. So, technically, they are still in school, but they do not accumulate debt while in MD/PhD. But we are talking about very tiny minority who end up in MD/PhD, vast majority of MD’s are at school for 8 years.</p>
<p>They have high student loans because they go to school for so long. They are effectively paid minimum wages as a resident.</p>
<p>I should also point out that most graduate students in Ph.D. programs either get a stipend, ta or research assistantship. So while an MD student typically cannot work, doesn’t get paid (my kid does tutor) for the 4 years, a Ph.D candidate many times will graduate without any debt from graduate school unlike an MD.</p>
<p>"They are effectively paid minimum wages as a resident. "</p>
<p>-I would not call $50K/year minimum wages, I would call it wage that you can live on. In addition, as many are married after 8 years (UG + Med. School), it is not too bad at all, if you consider most likely family income of $100+K/year. As I pointed above, many professionals in some economically depressed regions are happy to work for what MD residents are making in the same regions. They are happy just to have a job, period. Having higher pay is more or less luxury.</p>
<p>^^^ minimum wages are calculated hourly. So yes, in fact they don’t earn the minimum wage of $8 per hour in California.
Plus they are not paid overtime, which in CA any work over 12 hours are paid double.</p>
<p>I use to talk to a nurse who had worked in 2 different teaching hospitals. Residents are given something that is not available to nurses, NAs, or other hospital staff - a bed to sleep in. She was always complaining how difficult it was to find the residents at night because they were all asleep and not answering their pagers. Should they still be paid double-time for this?</p>
<p>GTAlum - to answer the question several pages back about the 2 doctors making less money than 30 years ago - the anasthesiologist works for a large public hospital and reimbursements have dropped over the years while expenses have risen. The primary care doc switched from urgent care to a family clinic, without the bedside manner to succeed well at the latter. He still made a lot more than the NPs, even while seeing fewer patients. The clinic manager laid off the NPs hoping to increase the Dr.'s quantity of patients, but they ended up having to close the office when profits (and patients) went away.</p>
<p>I was talking to a local physician over the weekend. In his office, they have 4 physicians, a nurse practitioner, and a physician assistant. He was saying how they could really use to hire additional staff, but one thing holding them back is the expense of pay those new providers…</p>
<p>"-I would not call $50K/year minimum wages, I would call it wage that you can live on."</p>
<p>its not minimum wages if they work a 40 hr week which they don’t.</p>
<p>Yeah, $50K is a wage a D.O. or M.D. resident can live on, for 3-5 years, while their Graduate PLUS loans (and probably undergraduate Stafford loans as well) are ticking away in deferment. During that time, just because a resident doesn’t have to make payments doesn’t mean that the interest doesn’t continue to accrue. And interest on $250K at 7.9% is some serious stuff.</p>
<p>My D will be a resident in a couple years & all I’m hoping is that when she finally is able to practice in 2017-2019 that the health care structure won’t have imploded by then & the loans don’t totally eat her alive, because unless she lives with us at home during her residency (God forbid! :)), she won’t be able to contribute penny one to paying off those loans in that period.</p>
<p>That’s why a new doctor in practice has to make $100K or more right out of the box. I’ve told D to not plan on having any of ‘the good stuff’ until well into her 30’s, if then. But this is her choice.</p>
<p>“one thing holding them back is the expense of pay those new providers”</p>
<p>This is true of any and every business trying to make a profit (or non-profit trying to break even). :)</p>
<p>I wanna know what insurance co pays the best reimbursement to the GP.
I wanna know what insurance co pays on time to the GP.</p>
<p>The system gotta change. We’ve only gone part towards medical reform. Needs to go further. Damn, elected officials.</p>
<p>50k a year at roughly 80 hrs per week = $12 per hr which is roughly what a cashier earns at stop and shop</p>
<p>^ And then they don’t have any time to spend it, so anything left over after rent and food (is there anything left over?) can go toward paying off the horrendous loans.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Firemen do.</p>
<p>That nurse must be exaggerating. If the resident is not answering his/her page, she knows where the bed is, it’s not difficult to find it. And she should be reporting them to the resident-in-charge. There isn’t only ONE resident there at night, in a teaching hospital, there are many to turn to.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Still not “minimum wage.” And I thought I had read that residencies were starting to put limits on hours? Don’t remember what that number was…</p>
<p>Look, I think physicians deserve to make good money. But when they complain about “a measely $50k a year” when they are right out of school, that irks me.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>8 years is not out of school the same way as the typical college graduate which is 4 years.</p></li>
<li><p>Some are putting limits however they find ways around it - it is too profitable for a hospital to get cheap labor.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>And you don’t see a reason why after 8 years, they make the same as a cashier at Stop and Shop??? And usually with more than 100k of debt??</p>
<p>
+1</p>
<p>Hyperbole doesn’t help. A guaranteed $50K job after 4 years of post-graduate study - during which they are learning specialized skills needed for their future work - isn’t indentured servitude. And those skills qualify them for a guaranteed six-figure income three or four years later. That’s a better deal than pretty much anyone else gets. Half the law school graduates have no legal job at all after graduation, and 75% of the student loan debt. Most of those who do get a job have about the same $50K income - but no prospect of the guaranteed higher income down the road. Graduates of many private undergraduate schools have substantial debt without the prospect of any kind of financial security.</p>
<p>We all agree that “physicians deserve to make good money.” But guess what? They do. I get that there are lots of irritating things about the practice of medicine. But continued whining about the financial end of it is folly bordering on arrogance.</p>
<p>Check out :Is a career in medicine really worth it? This is on the premed section: careers in medicine portion of cc.</p>
<p>I am a physician and have many Top Doc awards. I am on the verge of filing for Bankruptcy. I can not make ends meet with low reimbursements, high rents, Medicare reimbursements, patients that don’t pay and feel they should not have to pay. Doctos are rich and don’t need the money. Everyone knows that. </p>
<p>Many docs are retiring. I am caught in the middle between the older Docs that can retire and the younger Docs that are not going into private practice.</p>
<p>I do not know any Docs making $400K plus or even 200K for that matter. No one complains about lawyers making millions off one case. They go to school for three years instaed of the eight plus years of training for Physicians.</p>
<p>Our best and brightest will go into Law, Computers or Business instead of Medicine. Hopefully eveyone will stay healthy. Whoa to us when we are no longer a country with smart competent doctors.</p>