Most physicians placed so far this year — 87 percent — have been hired as employees of hospitals or group practices, rather than placed in private practice settings, according to national physician search agency The Medicus Firm.
Here are 11 more key statistics on The Medicus Firm's physician placements between January and June this year.
- Average signing bonus for the first half of 2015: $21,595
- Private practice placements with physicians hired on an income guarantee, partnership or ownership arrangement: 11.7 percent
- Percentage of all placements in the first half of 2015 that were in family medicine: 18.6 percent
- Internal medicine placements: 11 percent
- Primary care placements (includes family medicine, internal medicine and pediatrics): 33.6 percent
- OB/GYN placements: 5.9 percent
- Psychiatry placements: 5 percent
- Hospitalist placements: 5 percent
- Rural community placements (population less than 25,000): 32 percent
- Mid-sized community placements (population of 25,000 to 500,000): 35 percent
- Urban placements (population greater than 500,000): 33 percent
Hiring trends this year show an increase in the volume of searches and placements for psychiatrists, which were ninth and tenth in most placed providers in 2012 and 2013 and have risen to be tied for fourth most placed this year. Hospitalist placement has dropped slightly from the No. 2 most placed to No. 4 with psychiatrists.
Employment rates are considerably high this year, according to The Medicus Firm, as are requests coming from more urban and mid-sized communities. Ten to 15 years ago, "the vast majority of clients seeking assistance from a highly specialized retained firm such as ours would have been rural hospitals," Jim Stone, president of The Medicus Firm, said in a statement. "However, more of our placements happened in urban, suburban, and mid-sized communities, than in rural settings."
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