Published on
The American Academy of Physician Associates (AAPA) released results from a new survey examining salaries, hourly wages, and total compensation for physician associates—also known as physician assistants or PAs. Among practice specialties, urgent care PAs ranked sixth in median total compensation, earning $152,397 annually. In terms of compensation models, 58% of urgent care PAs receive a salary, and 65% are eligible to earn a bonus. Respondents reported a median annual base compensation of $141,449 and a median bonus of $6,000 per year. Approximately 4.6% of PAs work in urgent care, putting in 40 hours per week, with a median of 9 years of experience. For benchmarking, PAs in the United States across all specialties report a median annual compensation of $147,000, according to the survey. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects 20% employment growth and approximately 12,000 job openings annually for PAs through 2034.
Care quality: Meanwhile, the American Medical Association (AMA) House of Delegates at a recent meeting voted to fund independent research to evaluate the care provided by PAs and nurse practitioners (NPs). Delegates are calling for “rigorous, independent data on the safety, efficacy, and cost of unsupervised NPs and PAs,” according to meeting coverage by MedPage Today. The goal is to publish objective research in peer-reviewed journals so the resulting findings can better inform regulators who develop scope-of-practice rules, delegates say.