Nurse practitioners and physician assistants both report high job satisfaction and growing salaries, according to a recent survey from PracticeMatch.
In fact, just 6 percent of NPs and PAs said they were unsatisfied with their careers.
PracticeMatch, which provides resources like job boards, career fairs and candidate leads to organizations that employ clinicians, surveyed 532 NPs and 558 PAs for its survey.
Here are seven statistics and key points on advanced practitioners' job satisfaction, signing bonuses and salary trends.
1. Thirty-eight percent of NPs and 44 percent of PAs are very satisfied with their careers, and one-third of each group said they were satisfied.
2. Signing bonuses have become more common in recent years, but still are not widespread — 14 percent of respondents with fewer than 10 years of experience received a signing bonus.
3. Signing bonuses for nurse practitioners were higher than for physician assistants, at $11,000 and $8,000 on average, respectively.
4. Roughly half of respondents saw their salary increase from 2015 to 2016. Thirteen percent saw their salaries increase by 4 to 7 percent, and 12 percent saw an increase of 8 percent or more.
5. Only 15 percent of respondents said they were extremely satisfied with their income, a quarter said they were very satisfied and most (44 percent) said they were merely satisfied.
6. Fifteen percent of PAs and NPs were not satisfied with their salary.
7. PAs and NPs with 11 to 20 years of experience made the most in base pay of any group, with a salary average of $119,330. Advanced practitioners with 10 years of experience or less earned an average of $103,120, and those with more than 20 years of experience had a base pay of $104,510.