Ortho Surgery Negotiations

[Jay2885]

I'll be graduating in May, I have an offer with a private practice, 5 days per week surgery with a few different physicians. I would be the first and only PA with the group.

 

5 days/week, 7-4ish no weekends or evenings, no call

85k Base salary

50% of my collections once my base salary is met through collections, I will have full access to monthly billing and collections

Full medical and dental

401K with match (waiting to hear on %)

CME 1 week, $2000 CME funds

Vacation 2 weeks paid

Malpractice fully covered

 

My question is for anyone working with collection-based incentives... Since they haven't had any prior P.A., the tentative plan is once I meet my collections 85k, I will start getting either monthly or quarterly collection checks, has anyone had experience with this? Is this a reasonable set up, or should I counter with a different collection payout setup?

 

Thanks!

[Walkoffshot]

Sounds reasonable. Really depends on the type of practice. How busy is your surgeon? What surgeries? In office procedures/injections? Ratio of private insurance/Medicare/work comp. in my previous job we saw a lot of Medicare... Definitely don't collect as much as you would with work comp. My current practice we see a majority of work comp. I don't see them personally (including initial, subsequent, post op visits) but collect a heck of a lot more for first assist in surgeries than I would billing to private or Medicare. We can do 3 WC shoulder scopes in the time it takes to do one hip replacement. The billing is significantly higher. I receive bonus based on collections but definitely not 50%... Would kill for that in the practice I'm in. Still compensated well though.

 

85 k is decent for a new grad. If your surgeon is efficient (presumably you would help with efficiency) then I don't see how you wouldn't make 100k easy. Again, it all depends on the current setup. You also have to consider that it takes time to get set up with Medicare and private insurance. Can take a few months before your up and running. I believe private insurance won't let you back bill, so you wouldn't be collecting much until your set up with them.

[Jay2885]

Thanks for the input! Mondays and Tuesdays are totals only (knees, hips and shoulders), Wednesday through Friday scopes, ACLs, etc... Yes on workers comp. No clinic at all though so I won't have to worry about pre ops and post ops taking from collections. How long did it take you to get set up with private payers? Is there anything I can do to help that process?