The cost of healthcare has been a very popular political topic for several decades. Several weeks ago, I received two separate emails that struck me as a bit odd. My group highly encouraged us via email to avoid any professional relationships by accepting gifts, food, or money from drug representatives. In a separate email that I received from my congressman, he wrote about how he was against net neutrality.… Read the rest
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Being a Medical Director is more than collecting a monthly paycheck. One of the most popular questions that I receive is how to make extra money as doctor. While there are many ways to make extra cash, becoming a medical director always seems to come up as a possible “easy” way to make money. While there are some perks, including financial benefits, there are also several risks to becoming a medical director.… Read the rest
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After 11 months of searching for a house, I’ve finally bought a home. The paperwork associated with buying a house is most likely not as difficult as soon to be new home owners think. The hardest part of the process was finding a house that I wanted to buy. For those who have been following this website, you know I’ve been searching for a long time.… Read the rest
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Doctors’ paychecks are often structured in one of three ways. Salary only, salary plus incentive bonuses, or production only. RVU (Relative value unit) is a method the United States Medicare system uses to value reimbursement for physician services. Some physician contracts, such as my contract, is 100% based on production, or how many RVU’s I bill for.
There are advantages and disadvantages to each system. … Read the rest
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I’ve recently seen a graph that was pretty jarring to say the least. The graph below has been copied in many different articles in the past years. The main claim in this graph is about explosive growth of administrators in health care positions. The growth of administration has increased since Medicaid and Medicare came into effect. However, I cant help but wonder how much of the growth is overblown or real.… Read the rest
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Graduating doctors often have a significant problem to overcome – student loan debt. Many new doctors will not consider a job unless there is some form of debt repayment or ability for debt forgiveness. Jobs that offer debt repayment can end up being a golden handcuff that keeps new doctors attached to their job for potentially longer than they would like.… Read the rest
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It’s no secret that physicians in private practice often times make more money than their colleagues in academic medicine. For hospitalist, the difference in pay can be greater than $100,000 a year! However, taking a job in academia is not all about income. There are many benefits that academic medicine gives to doctors that private practice jobs can fall short on.… Read the rest
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One of the most common questions that medical students, residents, or fellows will ask is should I use REPAYE or PAYE? These two programs seem to be the most popular plans available with IBR being a close third. Determining what plan is right for you could save you thousands of dollars if unable to use the standard repayment plan or refinance for lower interest rate.… Read the rest
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In many ares of medicine, there is the ability to undergo additional training for specialization. For most specialties, additional training via fellowship usually means increased income. One example of increased income is a physician who completed an internal medicine residency and then goes on to complete a cardiology fellowship.
Internal medicine is a 3 year program. Cardiology is at minimum another 3 years of fellowship beyond internal medicine training.… Read the rest
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This year I’ve finally made enough money to reach the Social Security contribution cutoff. The Social Security paycheck bonus occurs when an individual makes more than $127,200 per year. Any income beyond this amount no longer has taxes taken out for Social Security. New attendings who scrutinize their paycheck may notice a nice bump up in the take home pay when this threshold is reached.… Read the rest
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