I am always being asked “how much should a physician collaborator cost?” I always answer, “it depends.” There are four factors you need to consider:
It depends on how busy your practice will be.
It depends on your location.
It depends on the liability and risk of your service.
It depends on the relationship you have with the physician.
If you live in a restrictive state and want to start your own practice, you need to have a collaborator. There is no way around it. Implementing the Elite Nurse Practitioner Model in a restrictive state is more difficult, but it is still doable. So do not let this barrier to your practice get you down. You just need to be prepared for it.
Having a physician collaborator is just one more step, of many, when starting a practice in a restrictive practice state. So how much should you budget for when paying this “collaborator?” (Remember, they will be doing very little most of the time other than taking your money.)
It depends on how busy your practice will be: If you are first starting off and this practice will be a part time endeavor as I advocate for, then you should not pay this person very much. They will be doing nothing other than having their name associated with your practice. If you are only seeing 15-20 patients a month, then you need to make this fact apparent to the physician and let them know this is very part time, thus they should be paid on a part time basis. I believe $500 a month is fair for doing nothing. If your practice is more of a full-time gig, you will need to pay at least $1,000 or more a month typically.
It depends on your location: Do you live in a saturated market or more of a rural area? If you live in a saturated market, the demand for a physician collaborator will likely be higher. If you live in a rural area, not so much. You could get away with paying $500 a month in a rural area, but a saturated market will increase the price to $1,000 simply because of supply and demand.
It depends on the liability and risk of your service: Are you giving out medical cannabis cards or managing peoples congestive heart failure? The lower the risk, the lower the price. The higher the risk, the higher the price. If your practice is low liability, I would not pay a physician more than $500 a month. They are taking very little risk and making free money. On the other hand, if you are undergoing a riskier endeavor, then the physician will require anything between $1,000-$2,000 a month.
It depends on the relationship with the physician: This is the most important factor to consider when looking for a physician collaborator. Is this person a friend? Professional colleague? Or a stranger? If the person is a friend or a long-term colleague, I would simply ask if they would be willing to do it for free or for $250-$500 a month. If the person is a stranger from some “collaborator” service or a physician a friend is using, then the cost will be closer to $1,000.
Overall, you need to budget $500-$1,500 a month for a collaborator. I would not pay more than $500 a month with a part time low risk practice. If I had a riskier service line and a higher volume practice, then I would consider $1,000. Personally though, I would not pay more than $1,000 a month for a collaborator in any situation.
Best of luck! I feel for my colleagues in restrictive states…
72 Responses
I charge $3000/month for my EMS medical direction. NP’s have more liability. I would expect at least $5000/month and even higher if more patients are being seen.
And thank god I live in an independent practice state for this exact reason. It is my opinion that $5,000 a month for “supervision” is robbery and a significant expense for the NP entrepreneur.
Exactly!! I do not know any NP willing to pay that kind of money! I do live in a restrictive state and this is why I practice in a FPA state.
Ya its absurd
What about an RN, Michael?
So you don’t even know who has “,more liability” and no one in their right mind will pay you that much bud.
Wow! So you all really expect a physician to risk their license for a few hundred dollars a month!
If you don’t want to supervise a NP then don’t! There are plenty of MDs out there that are willing to “risk” their license for $1,000 a month.
There is literally zero risk to physicians if they follow the rules and don’t do more than required as many do.
For free because they’re your friend? Are you crazy? Wow. I can’t even formulate a comment to the entitlement. Good luck!
yes
How is the physician risking his or her license if the NP has his or her own license with prescriptive authority and is carrying their own malpractice insurance… obviously there is a lot of room for improvement in understanding what “supervising or collaborating physician means”…
Do you know how much a Physican education cost? Who will cheapen their heard earned license for a few hundred dollars per month? Who wants to increase their liability for someone who’s had a fraction of a Physican education?
Yes I am fully aware of the cost. I knew plenty of physicians who supervised for $500-$1,000 a month when I lived on the east coast. I do not have to worry about this anymore as I practice in an independent practice state now. Thank god.
Collaboration and supervision or two different things collaboration just means a physician is available if NP has questions or needs to send the patient to someone who has more expertise in a area if they can’t handle. collaborate physician does not oversee every patient and is not responsible for every patient the NP sees. Stop Making comments on stuff you know nothing about. Again if u don’t want to collaborate that’s fine we don’t want u to!
Thank you Bryan for bringing this to attention as I get so tired of having to explain this.
Absolutely correct.
Tell me again why I Need to know what your student loan debt is? Why do I want to hire someone with issues and an attitude problem? Am I going to have to tolerate you showing up as if you aren’t forced upon me then hear you tell me how inadequate I am? Sounds like you are incredibly miserable..
Your statement is false
“(Remember, they will be doing very little most of the time other than taking your money)”
Right. For YOUR LIABILITY they are assuming for the supervision. Why would you think someone who has given away close to or more than a decade of their adult life to learn how to be a physician, with all the risks of being one of these in today’s litigious society, should not be compensated for