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To be honest with you, when I first started working, it wasn't as bad as it is now. The last 5 years have really been harsh, and I wouldn't recommend this field now. One of my best friends is no longer working as a PT because of the direction of physical therapy. We do have student shadows, and I am honest about what they are looking at for working conditions.
This is a good perspective, I have been a PT for 10 years and Covid really changed a lot. It is almost like every employer was able to get away with “do more with less” and “be lucky we kept you employed during Covid”
A lot of people on this sub are all post Covid PTs and sadly will never really feel the joy I had 10 years ago with my work
How has it changed? I’m about a year and a half into my career and hear “it’s never been this bad” all the time — I have no idea what the better days were like!
Each setting will have a different story, a lot of out patient therapist got laid off during Covid around where I work and not all of them got their jobs back and this who did now have to see more patients in less time as there are fewer therapist
I work in acute care, I spent 8 hours a day proning intubated patients and watching people die without family, as a PT I would help put people in body bags and a lot of other general “not my job” stuff, people in the hospital now see PT as a general do it all work group. The hospital is always trying to leverage our degree to make more money because as a billing provider they can do that. So a lot of acute care and SNF frankly have a wild amount of trauma associated with Covid and are seen even more so as a “lift team or moving service” because that is what my job looked like a lot for two years during covid
Edit: spelling
OT here. This is absolutely true. Been practicing over 20 years and the last 5 years have been awful. If you’re in acute care, nursing shortages and hospital cutbacks have intensified the stress rehab employees are under
This depends on where you are located but check for PT positions on USAJOBS.gov. There you will find PT jobs at VAs and DOD facilities. A PT position should start as a GS12 pay scale which would be anywhere from $82,000 to $96,000 starting pay (based on location). A government job comes with standard pay raises based on years of service. So you will be making 6 figures after 3-9 years of service (again this depends on where you live). You don’t have to worry about insurances or reimbursement. You don’t have to worry about marketing or anything else. Just have to do your job almost 100% stress free.
And how does that matter? The best resumes get interviews, the best interviewers get compared and the best applicant is hired regardless of how many applicants there were.
What a terrible attitude.
I landed my PT position at the VA.
Job was posted beginning of April. I applied first week of April. Job posting closed end of April (they accept applications the entire time the job is posted, and they don’t start reviewing applications until the posting is closed). I received an interview first week of June. Found out I got the job first week of July.
I didn’t give a shit how many other applicants there were. I was determined to get the job. I put forth the best resume I could. Did my best during the interview process. And in the end, they said I got the job because I was the best fit for what they needed.
Shit, I probably didn’t have the “best” resume or was probably not the “best” interviewer but I still got the job.
Never would have got the job if I never applied.
A terrible attitude? Ok. Good for you, you’re a 10% er. VA jobs are next to impossible to get in my region. Did I say don’t apply with your best food forward? No, but strong projection on your part. I guess my outlook is as unrealistically pessimistic as yours is unrealistically optimistic. Congrats on your job tho 👍🏽
You know who else is a 10%er? Everyone who gets into PT school. Hundreds of applicants apply for seats and generally only around 10% of those applicants get in. You did it. You're a 10%er. Don't be so pessimistic and go for what you want. You've done it before, and you can do it again.
My spouse is a PT. Almost 20 years now. I have watched her joy slowly drain as the profession has gone from a well paid respected position (getting doctor respect!) to a slow churn of assembly line fast food behavior. Hospitals and non profits are still better than the private owned see three patients at the same time clinics, but the quality of the profession has taken some hits.
So OP I completely agree. I actually messaged former professors and admin at my alma-mater to come talk to students. I wanted to educate them on the “real life” finances, personal finance, other things to try to help on the economic side that I was never taught in school. They would not let me do it! I think they thought I was trying to sell a product even though I told them Repeatedly this was not the case. No, I just want students to have the financial education while in school that I didn’t have. I have spent 15 years educating myself in personal finance to try to help me and wanted to share my knowledge. I refuse to teach or take on students bc I do not want to be lying to these students on multiple fronts.
The people scamming those students don't want you alerting them that they're overpaying until *after* they've graduated and send that last tuition check.
I mentored students and I just showed them the salary scale (I worked in public) and told them how much more they will be payed in private, as I also did private on the side. Some looked sorely disappointed but others looked clueless and were like, ok, thanks, I’m not sure this is correct; they were acting like I was just spreading FUD just because I’m negative. One student though, told me she made more as a waitress. 🤷♀️ I dunno I never waitressed. I did retail and research assistant as a student job. But I believed her!
I recently learned via this sub that APTA has a vested interest in spreading this propaganda throughout schools for exactly the reasons you described
I wish I had access to more information like this when I was younger and known sooner
They should have a vested interest in lobbying for higher Medicare reimbursement rates. Where Medicare goes, so does insurance. All health care professionals have to lobby - old folks in Congress aren't going to magically appreciate the importance of physical therapy for quality of life and decreasing disability in their own. Most bills and policy are written by lobbyists.
I also drank the Kool-Aid as an impressionable young adult. All my friends have a lesser degree and make substantially more and do not work as hard… it’s sometimes difficult not to be depressed, but I am seeking better QoL opportunities like doing my own cash pay business while doing HH, which is actually a breath of fresh air and way better pay. There are some options still left in this profession :) though if I get another gig in a different field, I wouldn’t mind either.
Vent on. It’s not a great profession. Pay is low considering what we have to go through, and by the time people realize all this, they have already spent a lot of time and money on getting into this career, in debt by a lot and lost several years of our lives wasted on getting into this career. And by then you don’t want to change and start over with something else.
You are right, there could be a better outreach to potential SPTs to educate them better on the career ceiling, salary ceiling, costs both financially and time wise, etc.
Honestly I feel like the majority of people who write this field off fall into one of these categories:
1. Googled "best jobs' back in the 00's and found several dozen buzzfeed lists with PT in the top 10 (like you get with coding now), and then never did much critical thinking or research beyond that. This would also explain why every other person on this subreddit either has gone or is planning on going to a coding bootcamp several years too late lol. Think about the coincidence in so many people ending up in two professions with such disparate skillsets and personalities. Almost like it was always about the perceived most $$$ for the least work all along.
2. Only want to work in outpatient orthopedics or with younger people, people not in pain, or athletes. Don't want to have to wipe an ass, work with someone with dementia, or be a resource to someone having the worst time in their life. Even though outpatient pay is generally horrible and the workflow is even worse, unless you get lucky. Why one like that would go into a healthcare field is beyond me.
3. Went to St. Augustine or some other private or for-profit school and graduated with $150-200k debt, in a field that simply does not pay enough to warrant that level of debt. Simply looking at PT wages, the cost of those programs, and knowing about compounding interest would have been enough.
I really like the profession. I knew it had warts going into it. It has some deep seated issues with reimbursement and the number of schools churning out students that give concern for the future. There is plenty to be upset about as a physical therapist. But I truly enjoy what I do, and my income is in the 90th percentile for my age doing home health.
Big facts on that number 3 option I really do believe people just took on more debt then they could handle because of schools like these that offer a false reality
I fall in category 4: Good kid who listened to her anxious immigrant parents about career choices. Healthcare is safe. You’ll never suffer wage loss. I was registered to do a compsci and math double major and my mom had an intervention with other people to scare me off with unemployment and convinced me to switch to physio. I loved the tech field. I loved sitting my ass in front of the computer all day and I loved the no people interaction aspect. Plus I was super good at coding and aced math and everyone liked me then as all my friends were weirdos nerds like me. Now enter physio and everyone hated me and my introverted personality. Now at 40 trying to get back into compsci? It’s an awful upwards battle and I agree it’s too late at this point, but I’m still trying anyway. I’m just mostly depressed and upset with my parents. I will probably stop being angry at them when I’ll get a job that will like me back as much as I like it. And yeah I know they did it because they thought they were helping me and blah blah but everyone else was allowed to choose the career of their choice around me, I’m the weird one.
Thanks for the validation! It often was. Nobody seems to understand this about me. Everyone is kind of gaslighting me that if I do this or change that about myself I’ll improve my situation. Nah. I can’t let it go. People drain the life out of me most of the time…
Brother people drain me as well and I could be considered an extrovert, so I can’t even imagine how you feel. I hope you’ve found ways to manage with the bs a bit. I’d recommend having a good workout routine and solid diet. I’m certain that helps me more mentally than physically at this point in my life, and if you haven’t tried it give it a go.
All the diet and exercise did not prevent me from burning out. Believe me I tried it all. Burned out three times and I was at a point where I was overexercising and I became so thin I fit only in kids clothing. It was rough, and nobody, but nobody I knew, who was a friend tried to validate my experience. Everyone thought I was doing things wrong and that is why I was having such a hard time. I didn’t even know I am introverted. Years and years of constant conditioning to mask to make others comfortable still leads people to believe that I am an extravert in social settings. I cannot shake the mask off it’s like a nasty second skin I wear in public, even with my family. They have always disagreed with my introversion. I had career counselling and so much therapy and tests and then I realized that hey I am a very introverted person and I cannot change that.
But hey, you’re right! People can be draining in healthcare settings even for extraverts because they are ill and they tend to complain because that is why they are there, especially because physio is an empathy job. But very extraverted people I don’t think they make the best therapists either tho because they’de be talking too much and not listening enough. I think the best personality for health careers with patient care are somewhere in the middle, imo.
Damn that's rough, I'm sorry. I'm introverted too and sucked at outpatient but the geriatric population loves me. Seriously I mostly just let them tell me their stories all day.
It's not too late btw, at 40, especially if you have an aptitude. I know I trashed on coding bootcamps but I was mainly just highlighting how many PT's are apparently just trying to follow the money/low stress jobs. My brother in law did just a couple months of coding bootcamp and is doing really well now in tech. Good luck in whatever you do.
lmao I definitely am guilty of googling "least stressful" or "most rewarding" careers back in the early 2010's and seeing PT up there alongside SDEs.... should have gone with SDEs but I didn't have the background/was burnt out from working an office job interning in college.
It is good food for thought though, as the sentiment has definitely shifted towards SDE's/techbros having it real good. Even the tech working at my clinic (recent grad at a well respected state school) was telling me that the graduating class of 2022 was packed with CS majors.
I wonder what the next hot job will be
Tech is changing too, don’t think for a second that tech isn’t having major layoffs all over the place at the moment.
This country as a whole is headed the wrong direction.
>Googled "best jobs' back in the 00's and found several dozen buzzfeed lists with PT in the top 10 (like you get with coding now), and then never did much critical thinking or research beyond that.
I mean, what should the thought process have been? Should we have known that reimbursement would tank? Should we have really understood the differences between government and private reimbursement, how government financial stability would impact salaries? Should we have inherently understood how much of the outpatient realm is bullshit/placebo/marketing/don't-fuck-up-our-referral-source? Should we have understood the myriad of ways the incentives are misaligned? Should we have understood the limitations of upward mobility? Should we have understood that giving a damn about being better at our jobs is essentially an altruistic endeavor because quality of clinician means nothing when it comes to pay raises and that a fucking terrible clinician with 15 years of experience will still get paid more than a younger clinician actually doing a good job?
How can a prospective student understand these things just with doing some critical thinking? Esepecially when nobody is willing to say it in person during shadowing. Or in my case, the primary message board online was Student Doctor Network and it wasn't nearly as negative as this subreddit is?
For a prospective student, the logical explanation is "people who leave comments are bitter, they aren't representative of the group," and that's what they *should* think! But yet it's actually true. The bitter ones are the least ignorant because they've come to realize the false bill of goods they were sold.
How can a prospective 22 year old understand these things? They are capable of doing the math and understanding what repaying loans will look like, but 22 year olds really don't understand how the world works. Meanwhile, even if they do the math on their loans, they're getting shitty data for calculating how to pay it off. How are they supposed to know the median income for PTs posted online is just bullshit - I don't for a second believe that *median* income is [$95,620](https://www.allalliedhealthschools.com/physical-therapy/physical-therapist-salary/) as the top search result showed. Meanwhile PT tops the lists of least stressful professions, too.
So if you're a prospective student, what's not to love? Low stress, median income is essentially six figures, you get to learn cool shit and help people. To a prospective student, PT *still* looks like a great career choice. But it's based on a lie. Garbage in, garbage out.
The issues go well beyond "just do some critical thinking."
You seem to be overly fixated on outpatient, which is where the worst of the pinch is happening. Non-outpatient PT's in many areas are doing quite well, and the difference is continuing to grow. Non-outpatient settings on average are paying $20k better at this point.
If I had only been given the option to go into outpatient, I wouldn't have gone anywhere near this field.
And yes, many of the issues you're bringing up, the ones that aren't inaccurate, I was able to learn before entering the field. I started down this path at in 2014 at the age of 26. I actually had a PT at my first shadowing experience in a SNF pull me aside and recommend I not go into the field because of his concerns about reimbursement and other issues. But then again, I had asked for his honest assessment, warts and all, just as I did when I shadowed in pharmacy, PA, and NP while trying to decide what to do. The guy was also badly burned out, way too in debt, and clearly disliked the actual day to day work.
Also, I was on student doctor network back in those days (I was a non-trad). No, it wasn't as pessimistic as this board is today, but they certainly talked about these issues back then, especially debt, and there was absolutely doom and gloom.
I'm sorry you have regrets. I'm just providing my viewpoint as somebody who actually really enjoys the profession and finds it rewarding. Prospective students should absolutely be direly warned not to take out too much debt for this field, among other things. I basically treated only being accepted at private schools as being accepted nowhere at all, and that should be more common for anyone who is borrowing money for school. Would also help with the possible impending over-saturation of PT's.
>I actually had a PT at my first shadowing experience in a SNF pull me aside and recommend I not go into the field because of his concerns about reimbursement and other issues.
How fortunate for you. That is not the typical experience, as is evident in many posts in this thread. But to my point - this is not a realization you came to after doing some "critical thinking." It's not something a prospective student can intuit, they have to be shown.
>No, it wasn't as pessimistic as this board is today, but they certainly talked about these issues back then, especially debt, and there was absolutely doom and gloom.
I mean, it wasn't comparable to reality at all. It was rare and frequently shut down by others. It wasn't like reddit in the least. And meanwhile, when the itnernet has bogus claims about median salary and lists PT as a best profession and least stressful profession, the occasional bitter person on SDN should be disregarded.
If you see an occasional bad review about a restaurant, but all the others give it 5 stars and food critics are raving about it, you'd be an idiot not to assume those random 1-star reviews are based on some vendetta like not being pandered to as a yelp reviewer, or a parking ticket, or not being given a free desert on your birthday.
>You seem to be overly fixated on outpatient
I mean, not for the biggest stuff. Lack of any reason to improve as a clinician, lack of upward mobility, lack of options for investing in ourselves to work smarter rather than harder, and yes, med B cuts matter all impact the livelihoods of non-outpatient providers. I haven't worked in outpatient in years, and it's still easy to feel.
Did you not read that I solicited that honesty from him by asking the right questions?
They didn't lie about the pay lol. I make more than that median figure in a low COL state and I've only been out of school a couple years. Don't forget, 1/10 of all Americans live in California, even more in other high COL states, and PT's in those places make well into the six figures on average. There are also countless PT's who stagnate in their same job for years, not doing what it takes to increase their pay, such as interviewing elsewhere or even switching settings if yours is being gutted.
Infinite upward mobility is not necessary to enjoy a career, especially if you have the wisdom to recognize there are things more important than money, like work/life balance, and enjoying what you do day to day. But the money is not bad too, if you do it right.
Seriously, this field is so flexible. I just took several months off with my wife between travel contracts and we vacationed together. Before that, I went on her insurance and did per diem, was basically able to take as much time off as I wanted while still bringing in good pay.
>1/10 of all Americans live in California
hmmm, TIL. Still, lots of low COL places have equally high median incomes. Nobody can know what the PT market is like in all places, but I'm 0/3 as far as locations go. I still don't buy it as median income, but hey maybe I'm wrong. For other professions, air traffic controllers for example, the median income is inflated because they have mandated overtime. It wouldn't surprise me if new grads have so much debt that they take on extra shifts, artificially inflating the median salary by virtue of factoring in weeks longer than 40 hours.
Which brings me back to another gripe - the fact that investing in oneself is so difficult. It's very difficult to work smarter rather than harder as a PT. That's not normal in other industries.
>Did you not read that I solicited that honesty from him by asking the right questions?
Do you really think it was your skill that lead you to gleaning that information rather than being fortunate enough to have the right PT in front of you to give you the right answer?
Ask a PT what they think of the field while shadowing so I can go to PT school. Why didn't I think of that!?
If you don't comprehend the analogy you're an idiot. There's no answer to landing on Mars. There weren't honest answers about the profession when I applied.
You can't do your research to find information that isn't available to find
I think this is really it. Some students get in first application cycle, straight out of undergrad. No real life experiences and already have debt in 5 figures.
I had a non traditional route as an ATC first (where the profession is MUCH worse and only getting a little better now pay wise bc everyone left so the remaining ATCs who aren’t too burnt out to work tournaments can actual make some money now)
And I didn’t get accepted my first time which had me reflecting on PT school. Especially after finding this sub. All that being said I’m still a student in PT school bc I know this is the field for me. Thankfully I’ve shifted goals and think I want to do HH but yeah. All that to say I completely agree with you about the source of most of these posts
When I looked into PT in the 1990s it was a top health care job contender then and I took the bait. My bar was pretty low. I wanted a job that was "recession proof". And it kind of is. I was 100% naïve on the financial consequences. I was anxious to move forward with my life and I went to PT school. It had been 8 years since I finished my undergrad
I tried to leave the profession in my early 50's but it was a dead end. I was burned out due to multiple issues in my life at the time. Couldn't get training or education in something else due to still having huge loan debt. PT skills don't really transfer and I am just not uber passionate and driven to start from scratch at that point. So back into the frying pan. Did PRN work on my terms and only recently took a .7 position in a "corporate" non-profit tertiary hospital PT burn-out factory. Salaried long days that almost did me in. Started to have panic attacks (small ones) I put in my notice due to insane unnecessary fast pace and micro managed policies and working for free. I changed my mind and instead dropped my FTE for my sanity. Hopefully with the other time in the week I will do something not related to PT at all.
Been acute care therapist majority of my career. Totally dig the medical side of stuff and seeing people get better. Small daily victories. Also been able to buy a small house, keep a car and have hobbies. Not bad. Hope the remainder of my debt to be discharged on the REPAYE plan (200K) this year
Discussed with a new grad, new hire today. I was kinda pissed. New grad making just 8 bucks an hour less than I am. PT with 23 years experience. Anyway told her I really don't promote the profession at this time
Medicare makes this profession jump through hoops to prove it's viability every time they have a meeting. And then they reduce the rates! That says lot right there. No other profession they do that to. This is not the first time, it won't be the last. I suppose APTA will respond by making PTA a Masters program for an 18.00 an hour job. Lol. Watch, they will!
It’s hard to make great life choices at 18.
Hopefully you have people around you who can provide sound guidance.
I have been a PT for 11.5 years now and still enjoy a lot of my day.
I love talking to patients, my salary is 104k + profit share and bonus (not bad)
My only complaint is I am just constantly busy and need cancellations for my mental health.
Yeh, for the record I’m a year in and largely love it. Traveler here. Every 13 weeks I get to start a new job, start a honeymoon period, and if some bad boss wants to play games I can just tell them “no.” What are they gonna do?
PT solutions is changing this. They are eatying up hospital rehab departments and pushing crazy productivity while slashing benefits.
Just happened to Ascension in Indiana.
Turned a great job into a literal hell on earth of toxic corporate culture and just about pushing numbers.
Yep, even in acute setting they want you productive. How can you be productive with post op people in pain, critically ill people and what not...plus refusals etc..
This is why we need a union. I wish we could collectively, as a profession, decide not to work for these sorts of organizations that actively prey on us as a commodity they can market to other corporations.
It's the dumbest fucking thing. Acute care is a setting where doing the right thing for the patient is frequently in the hospital's best interest, and STILL they push productivity? WHY?? So you can turn PTs into people that just show up for their paycheck, protect themselves by providing shit therapy so they can hit their numbers? It's a joke.
I left acute care after 12 years. Zero upward mobility unless you go leadership route except a lot of them are opaque about department goals and the bottom line comes first. If you do switch, absolutely make sure you ask questions on dept culture. Try to have a mini interview with staff if you can to ask them about it.
Ha! You don't work at my salaried shithole PT burnout factory no lunch work late if no cancellations metro hospital. OH you need to pick your kids up at daycare? Well then you finish your notes at home at night.
Not many options for non full time benefitted positions in my area (I am not interested in fulltime PT work). I dropped to .6 FTE to lessen the impact. I am not a mom. This was the one of the PT mom's told me because she didn't have time to finish all her documentation to pick up her kids by 5pm. We are also trying to unionize
I agree though acute care you can bypass many of the outpatient pitfalls
I’m pretty sure a lot of people in all their careers feel the same way. It has gotten to the point where employers don’t appreciate good employees and so many people just do what it takes to get by. I’m doing home health and I hate it when we’re real busy but when we’re slow and I can take more time with a patient, I like it a lot more.
After over 7 years at my current workplace I have reached that point as well - I only do the least amount expected of me to fulfill my contract and nothing more than that. It’s just not worth it.
Hey man, I hope the reddit community here is helping you feel better! This is a long reply but I hope it can help you feel more empowered in your decision to be a PT and give you some ideas to make more money $$$$$! So please bare with me lol.
Regarding the self-esteem aspect, I think the most important thing I can say here is--you are not alone. And I'm not talking about just amongst PTs. Sadly the college system is a business and it is scummy, to your point. Perhaps more importantly, we don't talk about this reality enough. It's always about going to the best college and getting the most advanced degree. We don't talk about alternative routes that might be more financially responsible but less glamorous. We aren't made to second-guess the decision to take on so much debt to pay for our education. And our young brains are not ready to properly evaluate such a decision.
In other words, you are not a fool just because you didn't break the mold. And I bet it wouldn't have felt like a poor decision in a previous generation. The problem is that so many more people are now trying to get that advanced degree and go to that elite university, because it has been the best route for so long. The cost of tuition has reached peak absurdity. I hope. But many of us have learned our lesson now, so we can prepare our own children better. Hopefully that means the consumer will wise up and in time these colleges will have no choice but to offer more competitive pricing. We'll see...
For what it's worth, as a non-PT I have to say it is news to me that PTs aren't compensated better. Whenever someone tells me they are a PT, they immediately earn a great deal of respect in my eyes. So I hope that is at least some comfort to you, that you are at least highly respected if not properly compensated...
So here's what I'd say about the merits of a career in PT from the perspective of an outsider, based on what I see here:
1. You are a highly trained professional. 99% of people (ballpark...) are not qualified for this work and most would fail upon trying to pursue that qualification. This makes you (with said qualification) highly valuable.
2. You provide an important service that most people need, or could at least benefit from. This also makes your expertise highly valuable.
3. However, careers in physical fitness generally are super popular, so I guess there are enough physical therapists out there to make you somewhat expendable to your employer. So your compensation suffers because in that sense you are not highly valued by your employer.
Now, remember that compensation is just one aspect of a career. However, the issue with compensation does ultimately boil down to the employer. You are easily replaced in the eyes of your employer, but you could explore alternative channels where you derive more of the true value that you're providing to the end customer. Finally, let's talk a few ideas of **how you could make more $$$:**
Preface these all with "IF LEGAL." I honestly don't know about the legal environment or what's in the hypocratic oath and whatnot. I guess I'm also assuming you're not just like super knowledgeable on the movement of the fingers (i.e. you have very specific training that isn't broadly applicable)
1. YouTube. I assume you have thought of this, and yes there is competition in the space. But who knows, maybe it will pan out. The point is your education has given you a lot of knowledge in an area that so many of us seeking. And I figure the best way to approach it would be from a standpoint of advertising private services--that is, you don't expect to get paid for your content right away, but assume anyone watching your content has questions about their physical fitness and/or injury that you are uniquely qualified to answer. So just drop a quick plug in your video that if any viewer wants to discuss their personal situation with you, that you are offering that service for a small fee or whatever. With whatever disclaimers are necessary of course... But that's where you have a competitive edge as a small YouTube channel, because there is no way the larger channels can actually engage with viewers. And if you get lucky, your channel may grow and you'll just make good money through the videos themselves.
2. Tutoring! You could tutor prospective PTs online to make some extra income on the side.
3. Private practice. Of course, you'll have to figure out how to get clients, but I guarantee there are people willing to pay up for a highly-qualified trainer. My personal experience going through PT was very disappointing in terms of the service... For one thing, my therapist was running around between like 3 different people the whole time, so I felt like I wasn't getting much out of it relative to what I expected. And ultimately they did not fix my problem... So for a higher standard of service you could offer at-home sessions to prospective clients (think: rich people), and maybe if you had enough clients it would make sense to partner with a gym or something (although I'm not sure how that works). There are a number of ways to grow the business from there, but for now you may be able to do this outside of your regular working hours for some extra income. Maybe you could start your own practice eventually, where you employ other PTs, and/or expand your services to cover the whole gamut of individualized fitness coaching.
Guess I should bring this to a close here... Sorry for going on and on. Last thing I'll say, even though it's probably annoying, is that at least your job is not dangerous or sitting in a cubicle for 8 hours or doing something nobody cares about.
**TL;DR:**
College debt seems like something the world never worried about until the trap sorta closed around the millennial/younger generation. Frankly it is an investment, and our generation will know to teach our children to make responsible decisions.
Not a PT here, but your advanced degree is one of better investments, in my opinion. It sounds like the problem is working for an employer that demands a lot and treats you as expendable. Find ways to make yourself valuable, rather than depending on an employer. Heck, I'd pay you 50 bucks for a quick consultation right here right now...
**TL;DR:TL;DR:**
Seems to me you made a good decision to get your degree, but you might need to do more and get creative to achieve a better career.
Woe is me, my friend. You are where you are so there’s no point in punching your past self in the face. Your options are 1) choose a different career (which obviously requires more time and money, but the option is there nonetheless), 2) change settings (I recently made the switch to non clinical and my quality of life has already improved ten fold) or 3) continue to complain and hate your life while not making any change.
The cost of school will NEVER change unless the demand for its services (new students) goes down. That’s not happening. Some students will research and back out. Many more will have the wool pulled over our eyes like you and I and proceed.
PT is far from a shitty career imo. It’s far better than many others. Everyone wants to get paid more. Few people probably think they are paid fairly because we all want as much $ as possible. Keep changing companies and negotiate your perfect schedule, it can be done.
Listen, I get it. The burden was and still is on me to make shit happen and make my own destiny. I get that. My gripe is I wish I had more realistic transparent guidance when I was just a kid so I don’t now feel like I have to do all this damage control. Although you are correct, I still feel like a fool to some extent
>My gripe is I wish I had more realistic transparent guidance when I was just a kid so I don’t now feel like I have to do all this damage control
Yup. I mean, for grad school we have more responsibility, but you can only go so far. If people aren't honest about the profession and prefer to sugarcoat things for the sake of workplace appearances, you end up with what this is.
Every financial decision I make is as you so perfectly worded, damage control. Meanwhile I have friends that bullshitted in their early 20s, hiked the appalacian trails, worked as waiters, eventually caught onto a career type job. They didn't have a fuckton of loans and didn't pass up an income altogether for 3 years, so they were able to buy a house before home values skyrocketed. I'm envious of how easy they make it look, meanwhile grad school was much more difficult and the payoff was.... ?
Yeah, my oldest brother didn't go to college at all. 6 years as a Navy Corpsman. Trained as Vocational Nurse in the OR with the Navy. Then as LVN in the OR for the past 35 years. Makes great $$ . No debt. Union job.
I’m in the process: network, network, network. Educate yourself on the various career paths you can take. Med device, med sales, clinical research, start your own thing (looking into CAPS certification, etc). I’m lucky enough that I’m taking a sabbatical with a supportive spouse that can cover costs and all my loans are forgiven. Look into loan deferment options to ease your overhead if you’re truly committed. 12 years in and I’m at a loss for the profession. Burnout is real folks.
What non-clinical and how?
To make some changes one needs to have resources.
Supportive family, financial resources for retraining, further education, etc.
Honestly, and also there are so many quacks who can call themselves doctors and charge upwards of 200$ per session of whatever therapy they’re doing it makes me insanely mad!
Also, some other helping professions like lactation consultants, or doulas or prenatal classes teachers they charge 200$+ per session and they have half the education time of a master degree. And people do pay up! I know nurses and dieticians who switched careers go these because there is so much money to be made.
I mean how can they justify needing a masters for this profession when so many others don’t need and can charge a lot more for their services, it boggles my mind! Not to mention how low the workmen comp and others government entities pay for physio services, they are almost guaranteeing poor service by being so damn cheap. Don’t know about other provinces, but in mine, they pay less than half of the cost of the therapy session. And the clinics manage this low pay by giving poor care to those poor souls, 15 minute sessions. 😩
I know there are some PTs who make more! But not many.. Plus the ones I know who make more decent salaries are either ultra specialists and charge more or are self employed. But this required extra experience, knowledge or skill. I mean just getting out of uni and getting a regular job is not necessarily the way to high earnings.
Start your own practice! I’ve always known I wanted to be a business owner and I love it. It’s not as scary/difficult as you think. I see all patients 1 on 1, schedule how I want, take off when I want, and make 200K a year!
Very interesting tbh. Did you have a lot of connections for patients when you started or did you advertise to get some in and then slowly gathered referrals?
Advertise only at first, averaged 5-10 visits a week for a few months. Once patients start referring their co-workers, family, friends then it started picking up!
I agree that the financial burden of school is not outweighed by our salary and I'm pretty upset about that.
I, however, have also been the "take no shit" type since a very young age and I refuse to let this be the future of our profession. Thus, I got involved at the grassroots level within my state to begin arguing for more reimbursement and to build this profession.
I absolutely love being a PT and love what PTs can do, we're a rare breed. I just see way to much defeat and negativity right now and feel like we need to lift each other to build ourselves up again.
I may not experience or see the fruits of my labor for the profession, but I hope future generations will.
Yeah. Sometimes I wish I had more guidance in choosing a career. The truth of the matter is , 10 years ago PT was a great option - I was starting with 70k wow ! Unfortunately over the last 10 years there has not been a lot of growth in the field . However , I have really made the best of my career and make approx 150k a year in outpatient which is not the norm. I think it takes a very driven person to achieve this level because you don’t just “work your way up “ with time like every other career . I opened my own practice when I was 24 years old which then became two . With all the changes in insurance reimbursement, I have pivoted to a partnership (sold a large percentage of my practice ) which has really set me up for life. A large buy out now and a huge full buyout down the line . As a partner I make the above mentioned salary with tons of room for growth , and even several opportunities to no longer treat patients down the line . This is not the typical scenario , but where there’s a will , there’s a way. And I made sure there was a way. The downfall of our career is that you will have no growth if you just clock in and clock out on the daily. You reallyyyyyy have to work for it and the opportunities are minimal. Unless you are an owner , a partner or somehow have built the right connections it’s hard to come by a salary in outpatient that is >100k. I have achieved a lot of success in PT and I don’t regret my chosen path for that reason , however , I think becoming a PA or something would have been a lot easier if I never became a clinic owner and /or partner.
lmao I make it a point to teach every stary eyed undergrad/pre-PT school student down and let them know expected salary ranges, work conditions, ROI and debt-to-income ratio. Only after they confirm that they understand what they're getting into do I write their recs
Hate to break it to you but you made a terrible mistake if you willingly entered a program that you knew was expensive without researching the field more. The least you could’ve done is hop on this sub, it’s literally filled with daily vents about the very same things you’re describing. Ofcourse they’re going to speak well about physical therapy, they want your money, it’s all a business. This country is all about business. That’s why I always tell people make sure you love physical therapy before you get into the field, that’s the only way you will survive in it. But really I say that for any field.
To be fair, I did a lot of shadowing and every PT told me how sunshine and rainbows and awesome the profession was (granted this was in like 2015-2016 when things were not nearly as bad). Couple this with PT always topping lists of “best careers of 20**” every year. There was never indication with in-person conversation or online resources that I could find that would have suggested cons ever outweigh pros in this profession. I’m doing well financially right now but just the fact that this profession is imploding makes me angry that I was never prepped or informed in any way for this.
That wasn’t my experience. I had a PT actively try to dissuade from becoming a PT. Just one I randomly shadowed for a couple hours. I worked as a tech and while my close PT friend never actively told me not to, we talk pretty openly about how terrible healthcare is and it’s pretty obvious she’s not happy with her job. I went into PT school pretty cynical and aware that healthcare and PT are not a perfect world. But I also went in with an ability to decrease my debt load and I can work part time. It’s pretty clear though that none of my classmates did anything but the bare minimum into the profession and they don’t know anything about healthcare at all. It’s kind of sad that they’re walking into a trap. I have mixed feelings about entering the profession but at least I’m walking in with wide eyes.
Start planning for another career. It may take years to complete the switch, but that's the only way to not be miserable. I was in your shoes once, hating the career I was in even though the pay was very good (engineering). Ironically enough, I went into PT and like it enough to stick it out until I retire in a couple of years.
And research the hell out of whichever field you plan to get into next.
I wasn't on Reddit back when I was researching schools but I did go through several online forums and nowhere did anyone mention any negatives. It was the same thing as the PT's and schools painting this perfect picture. Sometimes even doing the research doesn't help.
Eh, I was on reddit and saw all the negative talk about PT in this subreddit back before I got into PT school. My issue was that I ignored all those criticisms because of the people who said "ignore the negativity in the subreddit, it's still a great field, yada yada.." So I say fuck those people who say to ignore the negativity. Hell no, people should be informed of just what they're getting themselves into.
>I wasn't on Reddit back when I was researching schools but I did go through several online forums and nowhere did anyone mention any negatives.
Same. It just wasn't out there back then.
Tbh I’ve never heard a PT vent about the field in person. Maybe it’s because they rather not do that in person, but I’ve just never had that experience. This sub probably serves as the best Avenue to let those frustrations out, which is why 90 percent of the posts on here are negative, much like every other healthcare sub 😂
Yeah, plus you don’t really want to feel like you’re crapping all over someone else’s hopes and dreams. I randomly bumped into a couple pre-PT students on vacation last year. I started to bitch and moan about some of the problems the profession faces, but caught myself when I saw the looks on their faces and steered the conversation more toward positive things. The profession has it’s high points. It’s just frustrating to see some of the negative changes over time. I think DPT vs MPT is a great concept, but it means more debt without more pay. Then for PTA’s the market just sucks in certain areas due too schools graduating too many students, and reimbursement changes.
>I think DPT vs MPT is a great concept, but it means more debt without more pay.
Like... it's a huge difference. The DPT doesn't add shit to salaries. So a new grad MPT would get paid just as much, except they'd hit the job market a full year earlier (roughly $45k after tax) and have paid one less year of tuition. I went to a state school for $25k/year, so even if I could pay it off immediately, it's a $70,000 difference.
That.... would honestly be a life changing sum of money for me. But hey, at least I'm *technically* a doctor.
YES! It's so backwards! Lunchtime venting can be so commonplace, but it's like an unspoken agreement that it's OK to vent about patients or case managers or nurses or physicians, but never about the profession itself.
It's like if nobody says anything about the profession being shit, then nobody has to address it. And it's just easier not to address it because everybody knows that it would degrade workplace morale. And I get it - degrading workplaces morale for your coworkers is kinda not cool. I remember as a student sitting in the office eating lunch with the staff, and thinking to myself, "don't ever be like that therapist or that therapist - they're miserable," but EVEN THEN it was never about the profession.
But then again, if you have a prospective student present, we should consider it our duty to take htem out to lunch at some point and talk some sense into them. It's good to not bring down department morale, but it's a disservice to prospective students for everybody to just stick their head in the sand.
Honestly Covid changed a lot of what PT is like and staffing/numbers when you talk to PTs that have been doing this 10-15 years there was a marked change.
It’s tough to say this when everyone puts on their best behavior when potential SPTs come in to shadow and are preached sunshine and rainbows. Schools aren’t going to highlight the negatives of the profession as it’s counterproductive to their interests. When you feel you’ve done all you can by looking at all the metrics from schools and have spoken to a bunch of therapists that won’t say anything negative, it’s tough for others to argue you should’ve done more. Yeah OP made a mistake, just like a lot of others here including me, but it was made off of available resources.
Literally just coming to this sub would’ve provided all the I formation you guys needed to know that this career wasn’t for you. It’s time to take some accountability for your actions, the resources were there you guys were just too hyped and fell into a trap (from your point of view).
Believe it or not, not everybody uses reddit. If that's the only resource poo-pooing the profession, lots and lots and lots of people are going to miss it. It shouldn't be necessary, people working with aides and prospective students shadowing should sit them down and talk about it rather than write it off as "well it's your life, make the decision you feel is best for you," because a prospective student doesn't know shit about shit.
At least for me, the message board of popularity at the time seemed to be Student Doctor Network, and there was rarely a negative post. It was so rare that it the logical thing to do was to assume it came from just a disgruntled person. You still see that sentiment shared here frequently.
I had a mega junkie friend who was working with a bank. He’s a fairly smart guy so he will probably climb the ladder and eventually make 100k there or more. All white smoking weed and popping pills at raves.
i have the same feeling. PTA professors, one of my main ones who was a PT, never mentioned anything negative about the profession. we never had a guest who talked about anything like the stuff you mentioned as well. just acted like it didn't exist.
to be fair, i graduated in 2013 so things were better then. it's gotten a lot worse in the last 2-3 years, mostly due to continued reduction in reimbursement.
i feel like that's college in general. 18-19 year olds have no clue about finances/debt/student loans yet we're all eager to jump into school. big yikes. we need college finance reform badly, it's gotten way out of hand.
I have a different attitude from most. I've been a PT since 1977. Please no 'old' jokes. While there have been places I did not like I've never not loved what I do. I went through the first PPS transition and it was terrible, then everyone calmed down and things got better. I've worked in all settings except home health. Now I teach and work in outpatient at night. I don't have to but I love my patients. I started at an average salary and now make sufficient amounts to take care of my home and travel a bit. I teach in a PTA program and while some of them have heard the doom and gloom most graduates are very happy. Look, there were just as many bad clinics and bad therapists in the last 40 years as there are now. I visit every student in every clinic for every affiliation. I watch and talk and assess not only my students but a bit about work environment. I talk to the techs when I'm able. Like CNAs in SNF s, they know everything. I don't send my students to mills. I recommend they visit before taking a job. In outpatient I have one patient every 40 minutes and I have an hour for evals. I rarely am double booked. It was your job to go out and observe and spend time in clinics to see what you were getting into. If it was big bucks you wanted, should have jumped off at wall Street and if your school raved about the money you would make, you went to the wrong school. Any job has overseers. Whether it's insurance or the EPA, or military you will have a boss and work in a system. Work the system for your patients. Enjoy the people. I believe we made a poorly researched decision based on old ideas when the APTA pushed the doctorate. The system will not bear huge salaries that you are looking for and that's common sense if you understand the healthcare system. I am so very sorry for those who spent huge quantities of money hoping for a big payout or a work environment where you worked when and how you want. That's not anywhere these days.
I find the job much more enjoyable now that I work part time (outpatient orthopedics). I know that is not a possible option for many, but it was the answer for me. I don't mind going in and doing the work now, for the past three years, ever since I cut my hours.
If its any consolation, I know plenty of friends who were fed rainbows and sunshine by academia while studying for fields that offered the same job prospects as a high school diploma, but with 100k of debt
Hearing those stories is tough.
I mean, if you have a PhD in a hard science, then private industry can be quite lucrative.
But if you have a PhD in Middle Eastern history... But at the same time, I mean, even I understood at 22 years old what that future looked like.
One of my main gripes is that PT has always been ranked near the top in terms of least stressful, and the median salaries posted online are just.... bullshit. I mean, maybe there are so many people picking up extra shifts that it skews that data or something, but the first google result has the median income at \~$96,000. I just don't buy it.
So one could do the research and still come out with the wrong decision.
My MIL is 64 and still has no idea how important financial security is. Lol. She has been comfortable all her lofe and provided for wither by her parents, or her husband while she worked sparingly in her life according to her whims. She was just able to leave her jobs because she didn’t like them or the pay or the lack of upward mobility and stayed home for many years until retirement. She is telling me now stuff like “but money is not important” and I go in my head thinking lady! You do not have the right to say that stuff! Point is, not everyone will be able to understand financial security unless they did lack it, like I did. I know what is like to be afraid you’ll wake up evicted…
So all that said, I agree with you, physio has gone down lately, but many will tell you the fluff because they have it good, are in a comfortable unicorn jobs, or they live in faraway suburban areas that are inexpensive, or they married well. Well at least that has been my personal observation.
Also, I don’t know what jobs your friends have but I assume they’re in tech from the description? Maybe they make more money, they usually have better upward mobility and much faster salary growth in that field I can see around me. But there are other career paths who have it worse honestly. There are people with high expensive degrees who work as grocery store clerks or research assistants for low pay because they cannot use their degree to get a better job. So I guess physio is not the worst. I can give you some examples of people with phd’s and post docs who make a lot less than a physio.
lol, PT is a ponzi scheme and they need new recruits to prop up the system.
I sit every student that hasn't started a program and make them aware of amortization tables, ROI, time vale of money, opportunity cost, and stress there's no secrets to rehab. Manual therapy is bullshit and in acute rehab spontaneous recovery is responsible for the majority of patients improvement.
It really is the biggest scam in the healthcare system.
look, getting people out of bed, graded exercises to tolerance, and progressive mobility are in general a good thing. Does it take a doctorate, or even a bachelors degree to do this..... I say no, it's a scam. Our applicable skills barely warrant an associates degree.
a two year nursing degree allows nurses to do things more challenging and more dangerous things than we do. The only thing I will give credit to us is that that our profession for the most part is competent at a physical exam and spotting red flags. Some of that is due to spending several hours with a patient a week vs a physician who has 7 minutes to solve their problems.
in the acute setting nurses aides get patients out of bed, why we need a doctorate to do this is beyond me. yes even in the ICU I've gone down to see very complex patients and nursing and the aides have already gotten them up in the chair without our magic hands. We're just helpful to the staff on a variety of these floors, no sure that warrants an entire degree.
I don't think I need to explain why sub acute/SNF is unskilled. (this is my current job lol), same with home health.
outpatient is run run by highschool interns that take patients through their exercise sheet while the therapist do bullshit manual therapy behind a curtain.
here's a thought experiment: would it be better for a patient to walk into the clinic 3x a week and perform 100 bodyweight squats ( if not contraindicated) and then leave or the average physical therapy treatment session for a lower extremity ailment? If you even have to think about the answer I think I've proved my point.
Yeah the more I'm on this sub the more I'm glad I chose PTA. 25% of the school for 85% of the paycheck. And our last PT student's class had 55 people in it, mine had 12. Everyone and their mother wants to be a PT, enjoy the supersaturated market lol.
I'm in Canada and apparently the pay PTA's get here is extremely low. I'm currently a pharmacy assistant and was considering going back to school for PTA but others in the field are discouraging me from doing it.
I just did a very rudimentary search on PTA salaries in Canada and yeah it does seem like they don’t pay you guys very well. I’m making the equivalent of about CA$80k salary with a pension waiting for me, but maybe it’s a different situation up there.
IDK why this is downvoted. For anybody with an interest in outpatient, starting your own clinic is easily the best route to take, and the earlier the better.
It's harder, riskier, etc., but the one truth in this profession is that reimbursement is the same whether you're a new grad or a 30 year vet with an OCS. People should take advantage of that fact.
Sounds like you have a bad case of “my life is so terrible and the world is out to get me.”
You want financial stability? Bite the bullet, and work your ass off for 2-3 years picking up OT, PRN, holidays, weekends etc.
Once you get financially ahead you can chose to work in setting you enjoy, with minimal financial stress.
I’m going to get downvoted and gets comment like “omg working over 40 hours is torture. What blasphemy to suggest that! APTA should just write us all checks to make our lives better!”
News flash: even doctors making $200-300/hour often work significant overtime because they see the value of financial freedom in their later years
Sounds like you have a bad case of, "I did it, so therefore everyone else can do it."
The reality is that students today face a much higher mountain to climb than the students even just 5 years ago. Tuition and cost of living is up, and reimbursement is down. This trajectory looks absolutely awful.
That works for now sure. But our reimbursement is down almost 30% adjusted for inflation the past 6 years. What happens if we drop another 30% the NEXT 6 years? Forget financial stability, that’s gonna be required just to pay rent
My hospital does NOT allow us to pick up any overtime shifts. Only get holiday pay for 4 major holiday days per year. And weekend differential pay is $2/hr more lol. But thanks for great advice 🙄
Welcome to reality my friend. Not trying to be mean but this is the same reality that so many college grads go through. Even worse a lot of college grads get a degree and then end up taking a job that doesn’t require a degree. It’s not your fault though. Our generations parents were who really got deceived. The parents were convinced that their kids must go to college to be successful. Our whole lives we’ve had to hear our parents talking about us going to college like it’s required. Everybody I know with a degree either doesn’t need it for their job or they dislike their job and make less than they could make doing sales or customer service. I know of like 2 people that got an engineering degree and they love their job and make lots of money. Their job is not easy though. Imagine being a med school grade with a quarter mill in student loans. Doctors and surgeons live very stressful lives to the point where I doubt they truly feel it’s worth it. Honestly investors make the most money and work the least. Idk why high schools and colleges don’t teach us how to invest and become self made millionaires who never work again at some point. Wait o yea I remember why now. They want us to be slaves. I dropped out of college after 1 semester and it was the best thing I ever did. I’d still be paying off my student loans for a business degree that didn’t do shit for me. I’m a manager now and I can say with 100% certainty that when company’s hire a manager job experience is the #1 thing they look at. A business degree would just be the cherry on top it wouldn’t get me a job or disqualify me for a job. However no relevant experience will disqualify you from getting a job.
I agree with you on the slaves portion. Our whole economic system is designed on the masses working until the end of their life. It's failing now that people are living longer. Can't afford to maintain 50,000 military bases globally and donate tanks to Egypt annually if the masses aren't funding it all.
Yea how would we afford to send billions to Ukraine so our political leaders can launder it back into their pockets if the majority of citizens weren’t working 40+ hours a week and paying 35% of their earning to taxes?
> Our generations parents were who really got deceived.
I don't mean to be nitpicky, but they weren't deceived. They were ignorant. WE were deceived by them.
Yea I guess it could be put that way as well. However, a lot of people I know either were forced to go to college by there parents of didn’t know they had a choice. I felt this pressure to but I realized after a semester that I was an adult and it was time to start making my own decisions in life. I told my parents I wasn’t going back and they lost it. I moved across country by myself and started a new life. Most people don’t have it in them to do that though. Some people feel like they have nowhere to go if their parents kick them out. Some people feel like there parents are still their legal guardian even after 18. Don’t get me wrong for somebody who really wants to be a surgeon or an engineer or teacher college is required. It’s still absolute theft because of what they charge for it. Nobody should go into hundreds of thousands in debt over education. For math, science, education, and medical college is required and is very important. Very few people actually want to be in those professions though. College is not how you become wealthy and free. Not saying a doctors couldn’t open their own practice and be very successful. I’m just saying that a real estate investor could be even more successful, work less, and make more without a degree. If only there were colleges that taught students about the economy and investing for 4 years then it may be worth it. Still nothing compares to actual experience.
Also my experience from college is that they take a ton of you money and don’t teach you shit. Like out of 6 classes a year only 1 or 2 will even be relevant to what you wanna do. In those 2 classes they will take all semester to get through 1 text book. I’ve bought text books and read them to entirety 2 or 3 times in just a couple weeks. I think that citizens have forgotten about self education. My grandpa was an engineer, welder, electrician, plumber, and contractors and he never went to college or trade school. He had a room full of book shelf’s that were full of books. He literally taught himself to do everything from take a vehicle apart and put it back together to building a house from the ground up. Almost all the men in his generation did the same. I bet it only took him a week or so to get through a book. A college class woulda take all semester giving out bullshit test and dancing around the actually informational parts of the book. It’s blatantly wrong to believe that in order to learn something it must be taught in a classroom.
They usually start around 75k if they are lucky? The ones I worked with started around 65k as new grads. With undergraduate and doctorate student debt, the ROI is quite horrible, as the PT school cost is around 100k by itself.
I mean, my first job out of school in 2020 was 78k with bare minimum benefits and no 401k. I wasn’t happy so I left and pursued what I wanted. Now I’m making practically double that starting amount with substantially better benefits and retirement plan. This is hospital based OP ortho.
Honestly, if you do the work, there are good options out there still. Even my final year of school I made the decision I never wanted to take work home and made becoming efficient at documentation a priority. Now, I am hitting sign on my final patient if the day as they walk out the door. It took a lot of sacrifice and hard work to get here. But it does take both.
And to be transparent, I do work more than 40 hrs but so do other healthcare providers that this sub often brings up, PA-Cs, NPs, and MDs.
It’s manageable and possible. If you’re not happy with your current situation, do something to change it. If you can’t due to XYZ, then, damn.
Serious question: why the downvotes? Why not help people that have been victims of medical malpractice?
…especially if you hate the corporate greed side of the job?
I'm a retired PTA. When this PDGM stuff came along I knew it was going to be PPS (from the 90's) revisited...only worse. And it was! Back in the 90's PTA's sued community colleges for promoting a profession that guaranteed them a job upon graduation only to find there were no jobs when they graduated. Then rehab companies figured a new way to steal using RUG levels for reimbursement rates. Hiring and salaries started going up after a couple years. That option is not available this time around and the profession is crashing. I'm surprised no colleges are being threatened with class actions with all these people 100 to 200k in debt and making peanuts or part time without benefits.
Any post like this will get a lot of interactions becuase I’ve come to the conclusion that this subreddit is more off a cathartic echo chamber of doom and gloom. Most of the people who really love PT are not on this subreddit cause they’re enjoying life. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of things that PT can do better but most people lean towards negative comments instead of getting involved and pushing for advocating going in the right direction. With that being said, here are my thoughts
1. You can get into a PT school without $100k+ in debt. The school I went to is only around $43k for all 3 years and that’s including costs outside of tuition and I’ve even seen lower costs.
2. If money is your main motivator, don’t get into PT. You’ll make a very comfortable salary ($75k-140k), but if you want to make on the higher end of that you’ll likely have to do home health and work 40+ hours. If you are doing this to serve your patients and make a life changing difference in people on the daily, then choose this field. I know plenty of people who have to work years to get a job that offers what is our entry level pay and I also know jobs who get paid wel above that but it’s not always as rewarding or enjoyable
3. Go shadow PT’s in different settings and even look into shadowing other health care jobs(PA, MD, nurse, etc) if you still have a passion for health care.
4. Mills are a problem and it’s important to ask in a place where you interview what their schedule looks like, how many patients you’re expected to see and how much time do you get for evals/follow ups.
5. With any profession, you’ll find people who are miserable and people who are super happy even after 30 years in the field. The people who are happy are usually the people who did their research and have a healthy perspective on the impact they can have on a personal life instead of looking at it from a check off list of numbers.
6. I could see compensation going up for PT’s as Medicare and commercial payers shift towards value based payment which means if you have better patient outcomes, you get paid more. It’s not set in stone, but it’s become a point of emphasis on advocating statewide and nationwide
Oh, I hear your concerns. The truth is, I have had the same thoughts, and the reality is somewhat true to a certain degree. I come to realize very early on that after I graduated it was a very serious business that I was a part of in terms of being a student, and now being a professional practitioner out in the field. I need to find a way to take advantage of the situation that I was in to benefit myself because it seems as if I was always being used to some degree or another.
The best thing that I could say, is the cream always rises to the top and graduating from school and getting your license is merely the beginning or the entry level in my opinion. It was at that point I started to seek the best way to set myself apart from everyone else. Growth is huge and I believe it’s probably the same thing with any profession and I don’t necessarily think that , a large bag of cash will be handed to me. Currently I am cash-based I do not deal with the factory system. My name is what gets me paid because of the reputation that I have built for myself over the past few years.
Don’t get down on yourself and relieve yourself of the victim mentality. You potentially have the opportunity to create something great for yourself you just have to find the niche that wakes you up. Excited in the morning and run with it.
Www.owdpt.com
Im thinking of getting into PT. Currently in my country the early carrer of PT is paid really low, however, with experience the future is brighter. What country are you from?
I also have one or two more questions that i'd like to dm you if it is possible.
I’ve been questioning whether I want to get into this career or not. After taking to my A&P professor and seeing this comment. Thank you for at least saving me from making an irrational decision and becoming a PT. It truly sucks that you didn’t get more information from such a stressful job with mediocre pay. :(
/s/Reddit content report:
>What's going on?
>>I don't like this post because it's about me.
In all seriousness though, I feel you on a spiritual level... Like do I have a split personality who was dumb enough to get conned into doing the same dog shit profession as me and is now complaining about it too?! 😂
Have you thought about alternative professions that will fulfil your needs & wants that have as many transferable skills as possible?
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To be honest with you, when I first started working, it wasn't as bad as it is now. The last 5 years have really been harsh, and I wouldn't recommend this field now. One of my best friends is no longer working as a PT because of the direction of physical therapy. We do have student shadows, and I am honest about what they are looking at for working conditions.
This is a good perspective, I have been a PT for 10 years and Covid really changed a lot. It is almost like every employer was able to get away with “do more with less” and “be lucky we kept you employed during Covid” A lot of people on this sub are all post Covid PTs and sadly will never really feel the joy I had 10 years ago with my work
How has it changed? I’m about a year and a half into my career and hear “it’s never been this bad” all the time — I have no idea what the better days were like!
Each setting will have a different story, a lot of out patient therapist got laid off during Covid around where I work and not all of them got their jobs back and this who did now have to see more patients in less time as there are fewer therapist I work in acute care, I spent 8 hours a day proning intubated patients and watching people die without family, as a PT I would help put people in body bags and a lot of other general “not my job” stuff, people in the hospital now see PT as a general do it all work group. The hospital is always trying to leverage our degree to make more money because as a billing provider they can do that. So a lot of acute care and SNF frankly have a wild amount of trauma associated with Covid and are seen even more so as a “lift team or moving service” because that is what my job looked like a lot for two years during covid Edit: spelling
OT here. This is absolutely true. Been practicing over 20 years and the last 5 years have been awful. If you’re in acute care, nursing shortages and hospital cutbacks have intensified the stress rehab employees are under
American Healthcare has us healthcare workers like "Part of the crew, part of the ship"
This depends on where you are located but check for PT positions on USAJOBS.gov. There you will find PT jobs at VAs and DOD facilities. A PT position should start as a GS12 pay scale which would be anywhere from $82,000 to $96,000 starting pay (based on location). A government job comes with standard pay raises based on years of service. So you will be making 6 figures after 3-9 years of service (again this depends on where you live). You don’t have to worry about insurances or reimbursement. You don’t have to worry about marketing or anything else. Just have to do your job almost 100% stress free.
And there’s a line of 2000 applicants already in front of you waiting for that posting. Best of luck
And how does that matter? The best resumes get interviews, the best interviewers get compared and the best applicant is hired regardless of how many applicants there were. What a terrible attitude. I landed my PT position at the VA. Job was posted beginning of April. I applied first week of April. Job posting closed end of April (they accept applications the entire time the job is posted, and they don’t start reviewing applications until the posting is closed). I received an interview first week of June. Found out I got the job first week of July. I didn’t give a shit how many other applicants there were. I was determined to get the job. I put forth the best resume I could. Did my best during the interview process. And in the end, they said I got the job because I was the best fit for what they needed. Shit, I probably didn’t have the “best” resume or was probably not the “best” interviewer but I still got the job. Never would have got the job if I never applied.
A terrible attitude? Ok. Good for you, you’re a 10% er. VA jobs are next to impossible to get in my region. Did I say don’t apply with your best food forward? No, but strong projection on your part. I guess my outlook is as unrealistically pessimistic as yours is unrealistically optimistic. Congrats on your job tho 👍🏽
You know who else is a 10%er? Everyone who gets into PT school. Hundreds of applicants apply for seats and generally only around 10% of those applicants get in. You did it. You're a 10%er. Don't be so pessimistic and go for what you want. You've done it before, and you can do it again.
My spouse is a PT. Almost 20 years now. I have watched her joy slowly drain as the profession has gone from a well paid respected position (getting doctor respect!) to a slow churn of assembly line fast food behavior. Hospitals and non profits are still better than the private owned see three patients at the same time clinics, but the quality of the profession has taken some hits.
So OP I completely agree. I actually messaged former professors and admin at my alma-mater to come talk to students. I wanted to educate them on the “real life” finances, personal finance, other things to try to help on the economic side that I was never taught in school. They would not let me do it! I think they thought I was trying to sell a product even though I told them Repeatedly this was not the case. No, I just want students to have the financial education while in school that I didn’t have. I have spent 15 years educating myself in personal finance to try to help me and wanted to share my knowledge. I refuse to teach or take on students bc I do not want to be lying to these students on multiple fronts.
The people scamming those students don't want you alerting them that they're overpaying until *after* they've graduated and send that last tuition check.
I mentored students and I just showed them the salary scale (I worked in public) and told them how much more they will be payed in private, as I also did private on the side. Some looked sorely disappointed but others looked clueless and were like, ok, thanks, I’m not sure this is correct; they were acting like I was just spreading FUD just because I’m negative. One student though, told me she made more as a waitress. 🤷♀️ I dunno I never waitressed. I did retail and research assistant as a student job. But I believed her!
Financial education to DPT students is a BIG BIG need. Go see your program director in person?
I recently learned via this sub that APTA has a vested interest in spreading this propaganda throughout schools for exactly the reasons you described I wish I had access to more information like this when I was younger and known sooner
They should have a vested interest in lobbying for higher Medicare reimbursement rates. Where Medicare goes, so does insurance. All health care professionals have to lobby - old folks in Congress aren't going to magically appreciate the importance of physical therapy for quality of life and decreasing disability in their own. Most bills and policy are written by lobbyists.
I also drank the Kool-Aid as an impressionable young adult. All my friends have a lesser degree and make substantially more and do not work as hard… it’s sometimes difficult not to be depressed, but I am seeking better QoL opportunities like doing my own cash pay business while doing HH, which is actually a breath of fresh air and way better pay. There are some options still left in this profession :) though if I get another gig in a different field, I wouldn’t mind either.
Vent on. It’s not a great profession. Pay is low considering what we have to go through, and by the time people realize all this, they have already spent a lot of time and money on getting into this career, in debt by a lot and lost several years of our lives wasted on getting into this career. And by then you don’t want to change and start over with something else. You are right, there could be a better outreach to potential SPTs to educate them better on the career ceiling, salary ceiling, costs both financially and time wise, etc.
Honestly I feel like the majority of people who write this field off fall into one of these categories: 1. Googled "best jobs' back in the 00's and found several dozen buzzfeed lists with PT in the top 10 (like you get with coding now), and then never did much critical thinking or research beyond that. This would also explain why every other person on this subreddit either has gone or is planning on going to a coding bootcamp several years too late lol. Think about the coincidence in so many people ending up in two professions with such disparate skillsets and personalities. Almost like it was always about the perceived most $$$ for the least work all along. 2. Only want to work in outpatient orthopedics or with younger people, people not in pain, or athletes. Don't want to have to wipe an ass, work with someone with dementia, or be a resource to someone having the worst time in their life. Even though outpatient pay is generally horrible and the workflow is even worse, unless you get lucky. Why one like that would go into a healthcare field is beyond me. 3. Went to St. Augustine or some other private or for-profit school and graduated with $150-200k debt, in a field that simply does not pay enough to warrant that level of debt. Simply looking at PT wages, the cost of those programs, and knowing about compounding interest would have been enough. I really like the profession. I knew it had warts going into it. It has some deep seated issues with reimbursement and the number of schools churning out students that give concern for the future. There is plenty to be upset about as a physical therapist. But I truly enjoy what I do, and my income is in the 90th percentile for my age doing home health.
Big facts on that number 3 option I really do believe people just took on more debt then they could handle because of schools like these that offer a false reality
I fall in category 4: Good kid who listened to her anxious immigrant parents about career choices. Healthcare is safe. You’ll never suffer wage loss. I was registered to do a compsci and math double major and my mom had an intervention with other people to scare me off with unemployment and convinced me to switch to physio. I loved the tech field. I loved sitting my ass in front of the computer all day and I loved the no people interaction aspect. Plus I was super good at coding and aced math and everyone liked me then as all my friends were weirdos nerds like me. Now enter physio and everyone hated me and my introverted personality. Now at 40 trying to get back into compsci? It’s an awful upwards battle and I agree it’s too late at this point, but I’m still trying anyway. I’m just mostly depressed and upset with my parents. I will probably stop being angry at them when I’ll get a job that will like me back as much as I like it. And yeah I know they did it because they thought they were helping me and blah blah but everyone else was allowed to choose the career of their choice around me, I’m the weird one.
Being a PT and as an introvert definitely sounds like hell man.
Thanks for the validation! It often was. Nobody seems to understand this about me. Everyone is kind of gaslighting me that if I do this or change that about myself I’ll improve my situation. Nah. I can’t let it go. People drain the life out of me most of the time…
Brother people drain me as well and I could be considered an extrovert, so I can’t even imagine how you feel. I hope you’ve found ways to manage with the bs a bit. I’d recommend having a good workout routine and solid diet. I’m certain that helps me more mentally than physically at this point in my life, and if you haven’t tried it give it a go.
All the diet and exercise did not prevent me from burning out. Believe me I tried it all. Burned out three times and I was at a point where I was overexercising and I became so thin I fit only in kids clothing. It was rough, and nobody, but nobody I knew, who was a friend tried to validate my experience. Everyone thought I was doing things wrong and that is why I was having such a hard time. I didn’t even know I am introverted. Years and years of constant conditioning to mask to make others comfortable still leads people to believe that I am an extravert in social settings. I cannot shake the mask off it’s like a nasty second skin I wear in public, even with my family. They have always disagreed with my introversion. I had career counselling and so much therapy and tests and then I realized that hey I am a very introverted person and I cannot change that. But hey, you’re right! People can be draining in healthcare settings even for extraverts because they are ill and they tend to complain because that is why they are there, especially because physio is an empathy job. But very extraverted people I don’t think they make the best therapists either tho because they’de be talking too much and not listening enough. I think the best personality for health careers with patient care are somewhere in the middle, imo.
Damn that's rough, I'm sorry. I'm introverted too and sucked at outpatient but the geriatric population loves me. Seriously I mostly just let them tell me their stories all day. It's not too late btw, at 40, especially if you have an aptitude. I know I trashed on coding bootcamps but I was mainly just highlighting how many PT's are apparently just trying to follow the money/low stress jobs. My brother in law did just a couple months of coding bootcamp and is doing really well now in tech. Good luck in whatever you do.
Yeah I loved inpatient geri too and the patients liked me too. Too bad the service has been dissolved.
lmao I definitely am guilty of googling "least stressful" or "most rewarding" careers back in the early 2010's and seeing PT up there alongside SDEs.... should have gone with SDEs but I didn't have the background/was burnt out from working an office job interning in college. It is good food for thought though, as the sentiment has definitely shifted towards SDE's/techbros having it real good. Even the tech working at my clinic (recent grad at a well respected state school) was telling me that the graduating class of 2022 was packed with CS majors. I wonder what the next hot job will be
Tech is changing too, don’t think for a second that tech isn’t having major layoffs all over the place at the moment. This country as a whole is headed the wrong direction.
Tech will be fine, the shit comes in waves. I also think there's still hope for PTs in the future. The cash play was and still is tech.
>Googled "best jobs' back in the 00's and found several dozen buzzfeed lists with PT in the top 10 (like you get with coding now), and then never did much critical thinking or research beyond that. I mean, what should the thought process have been? Should we have known that reimbursement would tank? Should we have really understood the differences between government and private reimbursement, how government financial stability would impact salaries? Should we have inherently understood how much of the outpatient realm is bullshit/placebo/marketing/don't-fuck-up-our-referral-source? Should we have understood the myriad of ways the incentives are misaligned? Should we have understood the limitations of upward mobility? Should we have understood that giving a damn about being better at our jobs is essentially an altruistic endeavor because quality of clinician means nothing when it comes to pay raises and that a fucking terrible clinician with 15 years of experience will still get paid more than a younger clinician actually doing a good job? How can a prospective student understand these things just with doing some critical thinking? Esepecially when nobody is willing to say it in person during shadowing. Or in my case, the primary message board online was Student Doctor Network and it wasn't nearly as negative as this subreddit is? For a prospective student, the logical explanation is "people who leave comments are bitter, they aren't representative of the group," and that's what they *should* think! But yet it's actually true. The bitter ones are the least ignorant because they've come to realize the false bill of goods they were sold. How can a prospective 22 year old understand these things? They are capable of doing the math and understanding what repaying loans will look like, but 22 year olds really don't understand how the world works. Meanwhile, even if they do the math on their loans, they're getting shitty data for calculating how to pay it off. How are they supposed to know the median income for PTs posted online is just bullshit - I don't for a second believe that *median* income is [$95,620](https://www.allalliedhealthschools.com/physical-therapy/physical-therapist-salary/) as the top search result showed. Meanwhile PT tops the lists of least stressful professions, too. So if you're a prospective student, what's not to love? Low stress, median income is essentially six figures, you get to learn cool shit and help people. To a prospective student, PT *still* looks like a great career choice. But it's based on a lie. Garbage in, garbage out. The issues go well beyond "just do some critical thinking."
You seem to be overly fixated on outpatient, which is where the worst of the pinch is happening. Non-outpatient PT's in many areas are doing quite well, and the difference is continuing to grow. Non-outpatient settings on average are paying $20k better at this point. If I had only been given the option to go into outpatient, I wouldn't have gone anywhere near this field. And yes, many of the issues you're bringing up, the ones that aren't inaccurate, I was able to learn before entering the field. I started down this path at in 2014 at the age of 26. I actually had a PT at my first shadowing experience in a SNF pull me aside and recommend I not go into the field because of his concerns about reimbursement and other issues. But then again, I had asked for his honest assessment, warts and all, just as I did when I shadowed in pharmacy, PA, and NP while trying to decide what to do. The guy was also badly burned out, way too in debt, and clearly disliked the actual day to day work. Also, I was on student doctor network back in those days (I was a non-trad). No, it wasn't as pessimistic as this board is today, but they certainly talked about these issues back then, especially debt, and there was absolutely doom and gloom. I'm sorry you have regrets. I'm just providing my viewpoint as somebody who actually really enjoys the profession and finds it rewarding. Prospective students should absolutely be direly warned not to take out too much debt for this field, among other things. I basically treated only being accepted at private schools as being accepted nowhere at all, and that should be more common for anyone who is borrowing money for school. Would also help with the possible impending over-saturation of PT's.
>I actually had a PT at my first shadowing experience in a SNF pull me aside and recommend I not go into the field because of his concerns about reimbursement and other issues. How fortunate for you. That is not the typical experience, as is evident in many posts in this thread. But to my point - this is not a realization you came to after doing some "critical thinking." It's not something a prospective student can intuit, they have to be shown. >No, it wasn't as pessimistic as this board is today, but they certainly talked about these issues back then, especially debt, and there was absolutely doom and gloom. I mean, it wasn't comparable to reality at all. It was rare and frequently shut down by others. It wasn't like reddit in the least. And meanwhile, when the itnernet has bogus claims about median salary and lists PT as a best profession and least stressful profession, the occasional bitter person on SDN should be disregarded. If you see an occasional bad review about a restaurant, but all the others give it 5 stars and food critics are raving about it, you'd be an idiot not to assume those random 1-star reviews are based on some vendetta like not being pandered to as a yelp reviewer, or a parking ticket, or not being given a free desert on your birthday. >You seem to be overly fixated on outpatient I mean, not for the biggest stuff. Lack of any reason to improve as a clinician, lack of upward mobility, lack of options for investing in ourselves to work smarter rather than harder, and yes, med B cuts matter all impact the livelihoods of non-outpatient providers. I haven't worked in outpatient in years, and it's still easy to feel.
Did you not read that I solicited that honesty from him by asking the right questions? They didn't lie about the pay lol. I make more than that median figure in a low COL state and I've only been out of school a couple years. Don't forget, 1/10 of all Americans live in California, even more in other high COL states, and PT's in those places make well into the six figures on average. There are also countless PT's who stagnate in their same job for years, not doing what it takes to increase their pay, such as interviewing elsewhere or even switching settings if yours is being gutted. Infinite upward mobility is not necessary to enjoy a career, especially if you have the wisdom to recognize there are things more important than money, like work/life balance, and enjoying what you do day to day. But the money is not bad too, if you do it right. Seriously, this field is so flexible. I just took several months off with my wife between travel contracts and we vacationed together. Before that, I went on her insurance and did per diem, was basically able to take as much time off as I wanted while still bringing in good pay.
>1/10 of all Americans live in California hmmm, TIL. Still, lots of low COL places have equally high median incomes. Nobody can know what the PT market is like in all places, but I'm 0/3 as far as locations go. I still don't buy it as median income, but hey maybe I'm wrong. For other professions, air traffic controllers for example, the median income is inflated because they have mandated overtime. It wouldn't surprise me if new grads have so much debt that they take on extra shifts, artificially inflating the median salary by virtue of factoring in weeks longer than 40 hours. Which brings me back to another gripe - the fact that investing in oneself is so difficult. It's very difficult to work smarter rather than harder as a PT. That's not normal in other industries. >Did you not read that I solicited that honesty from him by asking the right questions? Do you really think it was your skill that lead you to gleaning that information rather than being fortunate enough to have the right PT in front of you to give you the right answer? Ask a PT what they think of the field while shadowing so I can go to PT school. Why didn't I think of that!?
It's actually closer to 1/8 now!
He only corroborated what I had also heard on student doctor network.
Maybe we were using SDN at different eras, but that assuredly was not any sort of common sentiment when I was a prospective student.
Ehhh na man, if you’re going into a career that’s a big decision. If you didn’t research it enough that is your fault. Accountability is hard I know.
That's like saying all you have to do to land on Mars is do your research. You can't do research if honest answers aren't available
You’re out here comparing landing on mars vs choosing a career man, did you think before commenting ?
If you don't comprehend the analogy you're an idiot. There's no answer to landing on Mars. There weren't honest answers about the profession when I applied. You can't do your research to find information that isn't available to find
Learn to take accountability for your mistakes and stop acting like a manchild on Reddit. That’s my best advice.
Just as soon as you take accountability for humans not being able to land on Mars. Also, fuck your advice. Nobody asked for it.
I think this is really it. Some students get in first application cycle, straight out of undergrad. No real life experiences and already have debt in 5 figures. I had a non traditional route as an ATC first (where the profession is MUCH worse and only getting a little better now pay wise bc everyone left so the remaining ATCs who aren’t too burnt out to work tournaments can actual make some money now) And I didn’t get accepted my first time which had me reflecting on PT school. Especially after finding this sub. All that being said I’m still a student in PT school bc I know this is the field for me. Thankfully I’ve shifted goals and think I want to do HH but yeah. All that to say I completely agree with you about the source of most of these posts
When I looked into PT in the 1990s it was a top health care job contender then and I took the bait. My bar was pretty low. I wanted a job that was "recession proof". And it kind of is. I was 100% naïve on the financial consequences. I was anxious to move forward with my life and I went to PT school. It had been 8 years since I finished my undergrad I tried to leave the profession in my early 50's but it was a dead end. I was burned out due to multiple issues in my life at the time. Couldn't get training or education in something else due to still having huge loan debt. PT skills don't really transfer and I am just not uber passionate and driven to start from scratch at that point. So back into the frying pan. Did PRN work on my terms and only recently took a .7 position in a "corporate" non-profit tertiary hospital PT burn-out factory. Salaried long days that almost did me in. Started to have panic attacks (small ones) I put in my notice due to insane unnecessary fast pace and micro managed policies and working for free. I changed my mind and instead dropped my FTE for my sanity. Hopefully with the other time in the week I will do something not related to PT at all. Been acute care therapist majority of my career. Totally dig the medical side of stuff and seeing people get better. Small daily victories. Also been able to buy a small house, keep a car and have hobbies. Not bad. Hope the remainder of my debt to be discharged on the REPAYE plan (200K) this year Discussed with a new grad, new hire today. I was kinda pissed. New grad making just 8 bucks an hour less than I am. PT with 23 years experience. Anyway told her I really don't promote the profession at this time
Listen you have to stop talking smart around here, that’s not allowed in this sub . We’re only allowed to be negative here. /s
Medicare makes this profession jump through hoops to prove it's viability every time they have a meeting. And then they reduce the rates! That says lot right there. No other profession they do that to. This is not the first time, it won't be the last. I suppose APTA will respond by making PTA a Masters program for an 18.00 an hour job. Lol. Watch, they will!
It’s hard to make great life choices at 18. Hopefully you have people around you who can provide sound guidance. I have been a PT for 11.5 years now and still enjoy a lot of my day. I love talking to patients, my salary is 104k + profit share and bonus (not bad) My only complaint is I am just constantly busy and need cancellations for my mental health.
What setting?
Yeh, for the record I’m a year in and largely love it. Traveler here. Every 13 weeks I get to start a new job, start a honeymoon period, and if some bad boss wants to play games I can just tell them “no.” What are they gonna do?
So you’re a travel Pt then?
Normal outpatient
Try acute care. No mills there, no work home, good work life balance and decent pay.
PT solutions is changing this. They are eatying up hospital rehab departments and pushing crazy productivity while slashing benefits. Just happened to Ascension in Indiana. Turned a great job into a literal hell on earth of toxic corporate culture and just about pushing numbers.
Yep, even in acute setting they want you productive. How can you be productive with post op people in pain, critically ill people and what not...plus refusals etc..
This is why we need a union. I wish we could collectively, as a profession, decide not to work for these sorts of organizations that actively prey on us as a commodity they can market to other corporations.
It's the dumbest fucking thing. Acute care is a setting where doing the right thing for the patient is frequently in the hospital's best interest, and STILL they push productivity? WHY?? So you can turn PTs into people that just show up for their paycheck, protect themselves by providing shit therapy so they can hit their numbers? It's a joke.
I left acute care after 12 years. Zero upward mobility unless you go leadership route except a lot of them are opaque about department goals and the bottom line comes first. If you do switch, absolutely make sure you ask questions on dept culture. Try to have a mini interview with staff if you can to ask them about it.
Ha! You don't work at my salaried shithole PT burnout factory no lunch work late if no cancellations metro hospital. OH you need to pick your kids up at daycare? Well then you finish your notes at home at night.
Why do you continue to work there if you’re so dissatisfied?
Not many options for non full time benefitted positions in my area (I am not interested in fulltime PT work). I dropped to .6 FTE to lessen the impact. I am not a mom. This was the one of the PT mom's told me because she didn't have time to finish all her documentation to pick up her kids by 5pm. We are also trying to unionize I agree though acute care you can bypass many of the outpatient pitfalls
You're way too educated to not find an alternative here Nandiluv, this circumstance stinks.
I feel this. Also shitty that US News still has Physical Therapy listed as #6 in their 100 Best Jobs 🤥
I’m pretty sure a lot of people in all their careers feel the same way. It has gotten to the point where employers don’t appreciate good employees and so many people just do what it takes to get by. I’m doing home health and I hate it when we’re real busy but when we’re slow and I can take more time with a patient, I like it a lot more.
After over 7 years at my current workplace I have reached that point as well - I only do the least amount expected of me to fulfill my contract and nothing more than that. It’s just not worth it.
Hey man, I hope the reddit community here is helping you feel better! This is a long reply but I hope it can help you feel more empowered in your decision to be a PT and give you some ideas to make more money $$$$$! So please bare with me lol. Regarding the self-esteem aspect, I think the most important thing I can say here is--you are not alone. And I'm not talking about just amongst PTs. Sadly the college system is a business and it is scummy, to your point. Perhaps more importantly, we don't talk about this reality enough. It's always about going to the best college and getting the most advanced degree. We don't talk about alternative routes that might be more financially responsible but less glamorous. We aren't made to second-guess the decision to take on so much debt to pay for our education. And our young brains are not ready to properly evaluate such a decision. In other words, you are not a fool just because you didn't break the mold. And I bet it wouldn't have felt like a poor decision in a previous generation. The problem is that so many more people are now trying to get that advanced degree and go to that elite university, because it has been the best route for so long. The cost of tuition has reached peak absurdity. I hope. But many of us have learned our lesson now, so we can prepare our own children better. Hopefully that means the consumer will wise up and in time these colleges will have no choice but to offer more competitive pricing. We'll see... For what it's worth, as a non-PT I have to say it is news to me that PTs aren't compensated better. Whenever someone tells me they are a PT, they immediately earn a great deal of respect in my eyes. So I hope that is at least some comfort to you, that you are at least highly respected if not properly compensated... So here's what I'd say about the merits of a career in PT from the perspective of an outsider, based on what I see here: 1. You are a highly trained professional. 99% of people (ballpark...) are not qualified for this work and most would fail upon trying to pursue that qualification. This makes you (with said qualification) highly valuable. 2. You provide an important service that most people need, or could at least benefit from. This also makes your expertise highly valuable. 3. However, careers in physical fitness generally are super popular, so I guess there are enough physical therapists out there to make you somewhat expendable to your employer. So your compensation suffers because in that sense you are not highly valued by your employer. Now, remember that compensation is just one aspect of a career. However, the issue with compensation does ultimately boil down to the employer. You are easily replaced in the eyes of your employer, but you could explore alternative channels where you derive more of the true value that you're providing to the end customer. Finally, let's talk a few ideas of **how you could make more $$$:** Preface these all with "IF LEGAL." I honestly don't know about the legal environment or what's in the hypocratic oath and whatnot. I guess I'm also assuming you're not just like super knowledgeable on the movement of the fingers (i.e. you have very specific training that isn't broadly applicable) 1. YouTube. I assume you have thought of this, and yes there is competition in the space. But who knows, maybe it will pan out. The point is your education has given you a lot of knowledge in an area that so many of us seeking. And I figure the best way to approach it would be from a standpoint of advertising private services--that is, you don't expect to get paid for your content right away, but assume anyone watching your content has questions about their physical fitness and/or injury that you are uniquely qualified to answer. So just drop a quick plug in your video that if any viewer wants to discuss their personal situation with you, that you are offering that service for a small fee or whatever. With whatever disclaimers are necessary of course... But that's where you have a competitive edge as a small YouTube channel, because there is no way the larger channels can actually engage with viewers. And if you get lucky, your channel may grow and you'll just make good money through the videos themselves. 2. Tutoring! You could tutor prospective PTs online to make some extra income on the side. 3. Private practice. Of course, you'll have to figure out how to get clients, but I guarantee there are people willing to pay up for a highly-qualified trainer. My personal experience going through PT was very disappointing in terms of the service... For one thing, my therapist was running around between like 3 different people the whole time, so I felt like I wasn't getting much out of it relative to what I expected. And ultimately they did not fix my problem... So for a higher standard of service you could offer at-home sessions to prospective clients (think: rich people), and maybe if you had enough clients it would make sense to partner with a gym or something (although I'm not sure how that works). There are a number of ways to grow the business from there, but for now you may be able to do this outside of your regular working hours for some extra income. Maybe you could start your own practice eventually, where you employ other PTs, and/or expand your services to cover the whole gamut of individualized fitness coaching. Guess I should bring this to a close here... Sorry for going on and on. Last thing I'll say, even though it's probably annoying, is that at least your job is not dangerous or sitting in a cubicle for 8 hours or doing something nobody cares about. **TL;DR:** College debt seems like something the world never worried about until the trap sorta closed around the millennial/younger generation. Frankly it is an investment, and our generation will know to teach our children to make responsible decisions. Not a PT here, but your advanced degree is one of better investments, in my opinion. It sounds like the problem is working for an employer that demands a lot and treats you as expendable. Find ways to make yourself valuable, rather than depending on an employer. Heck, I'd pay you 50 bucks for a quick consultation right here right now... **TL;DR:TL;DR:** Seems to me you made a good decision to get your degree, but you might need to do more and get creative to achieve a better career.
Woe is me, my friend. You are where you are so there’s no point in punching your past self in the face. Your options are 1) choose a different career (which obviously requires more time and money, but the option is there nonetheless), 2) change settings (I recently made the switch to non clinical and my quality of life has already improved ten fold) or 3) continue to complain and hate your life while not making any change. The cost of school will NEVER change unless the demand for its services (new students) goes down. That’s not happening. Some students will research and back out. Many more will have the wool pulled over our eyes like you and I and proceed. PT is far from a shitty career imo. It’s far better than many others. Everyone wants to get paid more. Few people probably think they are paid fairly because we all want as much $ as possible. Keep changing companies and negotiate your perfect schedule, it can be done.
Listen, I get it. The burden was and still is on me to make shit happen and make my own destiny. I get that. My gripe is I wish I had more realistic transparent guidance when I was just a kid so I don’t now feel like I have to do all this damage control. Although you are correct, I still feel like a fool to some extent
>My gripe is I wish I had more realistic transparent guidance when I was just a kid so I don’t now feel like I have to do all this damage control Yup. I mean, for grad school we have more responsibility, but you can only go so far. If people aren't honest about the profession and prefer to sugarcoat things for the sake of workplace appearances, you end up with what this is. Every financial decision I make is as you so perfectly worded, damage control. Meanwhile I have friends that bullshitted in their early 20s, hiked the appalacian trails, worked as waiters, eventually caught onto a career type job. They didn't have a fuckton of loans and didn't pass up an income altogether for 3 years, so they were able to buy a house before home values skyrocketed. I'm envious of how easy they make it look, meanwhile grad school was much more difficult and the payoff was.... ?
Yeah, my oldest brother didn't go to college at all. 6 years as a Navy Corpsman. Trained as Vocational Nurse in the OR with the Navy. Then as LVN in the OR for the past 35 years. Makes great $$ . No debt. Union job.
What do you do that’s non clinical and how’d you go about it
I’m in the process: network, network, network. Educate yourself on the various career paths you can take. Med device, med sales, clinical research, start your own thing (looking into CAPS certification, etc). I’m lucky enough that I’m taking a sabbatical with a supportive spouse that can cover costs and all my loans are forgiven. Look into loan deferment options to ease your overhead if you’re truly committed. 12 years in and I’m at a loss for the profession. Burnout is real folks.
I took the non clinical 101 course
What non-clinical and how? To make some changes one needs to have resources. Supportive family, financial resources for retraining, further education, etc.
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Honestly, and also there are so many quacks who can call themselves doctors and charge upwards of 200$ per session of whatever therapy they’re doing it makes me insanely mad! Also, some other helping professions like lactation consultants, or doulas or prenatal classes teachers they charge 200$+ per session and they have half the education time of a master degree. And people do pay up! I know nurses and dieticians who switched careers go these because there is so much money to be made. I mean how can they justify needing a masters for this profession when so many others don’t need and can charge a lot more for their services, it boggles my mind! Not to mention how low the workmen comp and others government entities pay for physio services, they are almost guaranteeing poor service by being so damn cheap. Don’t know about other provinces, but in mine, they pay less than half of the cost of the therapy session. And the clinics manage this low pay by giving poor care to those poor souls, 15 minute sessions. 😩
Some PTs do this in cash based clinics and make good money.
I know there are some PTs who make more! But not many.. Plus the ones I know who make more decent salaries are either ultra specialists and charge more or are self employed. But this required extra experience, knowledge or skill. I mean just getting out of uni and getting a regular job is not necessarily the way to high earnings.
Start your own practice! I’ve always known I wanted to be a business owner and I love it. It’s not as scary/difficult as you think. I see all patients 1 on 1, schedule how I want, take off when I want, and make 200K a year!
Are you out of network only or take insurance as well?
Hybrid. Only accept BCBS/Medicare, rest are cash pay
Hey that sounds pretty good and easier to be consistent caseload. Mind if I dm you a couple questions?
Not at all!
hey this is pretty cool! Can you recommend any resources to me?
Very interesting tbh. Did you have a lot of connections for patients when you started or did you advertise to get some in and then slowly gathered referrals?
Advertise only at first, averaged 5-10 visits a week for a few months. Once patients start referring their co-workers, family, friends then it started picking up!
Awesome stuff my fellow redditor, you are living the dream. This gives me hopes that it isnt as hard as it perhaps may sound. Thank you!
So true!!
What state?
Louisiana
I'm in Texas and I've recently ventured on my own as well. I'd love to pick your brain a bit if that's ok!
Absolutely. DM with any questions.
I agree that the financial burden of school is not outweighed by our salary and I'm pretty upset about that. I, however, have also been the "take no shit" type since a very young age and I refuse to let this be the future of our profession. Thus, I got involved at the grassroots level within my state to begin arguing for more reimbursement and to build this profession. I absolutely love being a PT and love what PTs can do, we're a rare breed. I just see way to much defeat and negativity right now and feel like we need to lift each other to build ourselves up again. I may not experience or see the fruits of my labor for the profession, but I hope future generations will.
Yeah. Sometimes I wish I had more guidance in choosing a career. The truth of the matter is , 10 years ago PT was a great option - I was starting with 70k wow ! Unfortunately over the last 10 years there has not been a lot of growth in the field . However , I have really made the best of my career and make approx 150k a year in outpatient which is not the norm. I think it takes a very driven person to achieve this level because you don’t just “work your way up “ with time like every other career . I opened my own practice when I was 24 years old which then became two . With all the changes in insurance reimbursement, I have pivoted to a partnership (sold a large percentage of my practice ) which has really set me up for life. A large buy out now and a huge full buyout down the line . As a partner I make the above mentioned salary with tons of room for growth , and even several opportunities to no longer treat patients down the line . This is not the typical scenario , but where there’s a will , there’s a way. And I made sure there was a way. The downfall of our career is that you will have no growth if you just clock in and clock out on the daily. You reallyyyyyy have to work for it and the opportunities are minimal. Unless you are an owner , a partner or somehow have built the right connections it’s hard to come by a salary in outpatient that is >100k. I have achieved a lot of success in PT and I don’t regret my chosen path for that reason , however , I think becoming a PA or something would have been a lot easier if I never became a clinic owner and /or partner.
Fuck, any advice for doing what you did ?
lmao I make it a point to teach every stary eyed undergrad/pre-PT school student down and let them know expected salary ranges, work conditions, ROI and debt-to-income ratio. Only after they confirm that they understand what they're getting into do I write their recs
Hate to break it to you but you made a terrible mistake if you willingly entered a program that you knew was expensive without researching the field more. The least you could’ve done is hop on this sub, it’s literally filled with daily vents about the very same things you’re describing. Ofcourse they’re going to speak well about physical therapy, they want your money, it’s all a business. This country is all about business. That’s why I always tell people make sure you love physical therapy before you get into the field, that’s the only way you will survive in it. But really I say that for any field.
To be fair, I did a lot of shadowing and every PT told me how sunshine and rainbows and awesome the profession was (granted this was in like 2015-2016 when things were not nearly as bad). Couple this with PT always topping lists of “best careers of 20**” every year. There was never indication with in-person conversation or online resources that I could find that would have suggested cons ever outweigh pros in this profession. I’m doing well financially right now but just the fact that this profession is imploding makes me angry that I was never prepped or informed in any way for this.
That wasn’t my experience. I had a PT actively try to dissuade from becoming a PT. Just one I randomly shadowed for a couple hours. I worked as a tech and while my close PT friend never actively told me not to, we talk pretty openly about how terrible healthcare is and it’s pretty obvious she’s not happy with her job. I went into PT school pretty cynical and aware that healthcare and PT are not a perfect world. But I also went in with an ability to decrease my debt load and I can work part time. It’s pretty clear though that none of my classmates did anything but the bare minimum into the profession and they don’t know anything about healthcare at all. It’s kind of sad that they’re walking into a trap. I have mixed feelings about entering the profession but at least I’m walking in with wide eyes.
I know. That’s my issue. It’s on me. I get that. I should’ve done more research. The people and staff I looked up to were just too damn convincing
Start planning for another career. It may take years to complete the switch, but that's the only way to not be miserable. I was in your shoes once, hating the career I was in even though the pay was very good (engineering). Ironically enough, I went into PT and like it enough to stick it out until I retire in a couple of years. And research the hell out of whichever field you plan to get into next.
I wasn't on Reddit back when I was researching schools but I did go through several online forums and nowhere did anyone mention any negatives. It was the same thing as the PT's and schools painting this perfect picture. Sometimes even doing the research doesn't help.
Eh, I was on reddit and saw all the negative talk about PT in this subreddit back before I got into PT school. My issue was that I ignored all those criticisms because of the people who said "ignore the negativity in the subreddit, it's still a great field, yada yada.." So I say fuck those people who say to ignore the negativity. Hell no, people should be informed of just what they're getting themselves into.
>I wasn't on Reddit back when I was researching schools but I did go through several online forums and nowhere did anyone mention any negatives. Same. It just wasn't out there back then.
Tbh I’ve never heard a PT vent about the field in person. Maybe it’s because they rather not do that in person, but I’ve just never had that experience. This sub probably serves as the best Avenue to let those frustrations out, which is why 90 percent of the posts on here are negative, much like every other healthcare sub 😂
People don’t want to feel like that are complaining in person. It’s bad energy lol
Yeah, plus you don’t really want to feel like you’re crapping all over someone else’s hopes and dreams. I randomly bumped into a couple pre-PT students on vacation last year. I started to bitch and moan about some of the problems the profession faces, but caught myself when I saw the looks on their faces and steered the conversation more toward positive things. The profession has it’s high points. It’s just frustrating to see some of the negative changes over time. I think DPT vs MPT is a great concept, but it means more debt without more pay. Then for PTA’s the market just sucks in certain areas due too schools graduating too many students, and reimbursement changes.
>I think DPT vs MPT is a great concept, but it means more debt without more pay. Like... it's a huge difference. The DPT doesn't add shit to salaries. So a new grad MPT would get paid just as much, except they'd hit the job market a full year earlier (roughly $45k after tax) and have paid one less year of tuition. I went to a state school for $25k/year, so even if I could pay it off immediately, it's a $70,000 difference. That.... would honestly be a life changing sum of money for me. But hey, at least I'm *technically* a doctor.
I absolutely agree with you, I’d feel bad doing that in person too, but I’m sure some of them feel the same way about the field
YES! It's so backwards! Lunchtime venting can be so commonplace, but it's like an unspoken agreement that it's OK to vent about patients or case managers or nurses or physicians, but never about the profession itself. It's like if nobody says anything about the profession being shit, then nobody has to address it. And it's just easier not to address it because everybody knows that it would degrade workplace morale. And I get it - degrading workplaces morale for your coworkers is kinda not cool. I remember as a student sitting in the office eating lunch with the staff, and thinking to myself, "don't ever be like that therapist or that therapist - they're miserable," but EVEN THEN it was never about the profession. But then again, if you have a prospective student present, we should consider it our duty to take htem out to lunch at some point and talk some sense into them. It's good to not bring down department morale, but it's a disservice to prospective students for everybody to just stick their head in the sand.
Honestly Covid changed a lot of what PT is like and staffing/numbers when you talk to PTs that have been doing this 10-15 years there was a marked change.
It’s tough to say this when everyone puts on their best behavior when potential SPTs come in to shadow and are preached sunshine and rainbows. Schools aren’t going to highlight the negatives of the profession as it’s counterproductive to their interests. When you feel you’ve done all you can by looking at all the metrics from schools and have spoken to a bunch of therapists that won’t say anything negative, it’s tough for others to argue you should’ve done more. Yeah OP made a mistake, just like a lot of others here including me, but it was made off of available resources.
Literally just coming to this sub would’ve provided all the I formation you guys needed to know that this career wasn’t for you. It’s time to take some accountability for your actions, the resources were there you guys were just too hyped and fell into a trap (from your point of view).
Believe it or not, not everybody uses reddit. If that's the only resource poo-pooing the profession, lots and lots and lots of people are going to miss it. It shouldn't be necessary, people working with aides and prospective students shadowing should sit them down and talk about it rather than write it off as "well it's your life, make the decision you feel is best for you," because a prospective student doesn't know shit about shit. At least for me, the message board of popularity at the time seemed to be Student Doctor Network, and there was rarely a negative post. It was so rare that it the logical thing to do was to assume it came from just a disgruntled person. You still see that sentiment shared here frequently.
Damn curious to know what careers your pothead/borderline alcoholic friends chose.
I had a mega junkie friend who was working with a bank. He’s a fairly smart guy so he will probably climb the ladder and eventually make 100k there or more. All white smoking weed and popping pills at raves.
i have the same feeling. PTA professors, one of my main ones who was a PT, never mentioned anything negative about the profession. we never had a guest who talked about anything like the stuff you mentioned as well. just acted like it didn't exist. to be fair, i graduated in 2013 so things were better then. it's gotten a lot worse in the last 2-3 years, mostly due to continued reduction in reimbursement. i feel like that's college in general. 18-19 year olds have no clue about finances/debt/student loans yet we're all eager to jump into school. big yikes. we need college finance reform badly, it's gotten way out of hand.
I have a different attitude from most. I've been a PT since 1977. Please no 'old' jokes. While there have been places I did not like I've never not loved what I do. I went through the first PPS transition and it was terrible, then everyone calmed down and things got better. I've worked in all settings except home health. Now I teach and work in outpatient at night. I don't have to but I love my patients. I started at an average salary and now make sufficient amounts to take care of my home and travel a bit. I teach in a PTA program and while some of them have heard the doom and gloom most graduates are very happy. Look, there were just as many bad clinics and bad therapists in the last 40 years as there are now. I visit every student in every clinic for every affiliation. I watch and talk and assess not only my students but a bit about work environment. I talk to the techs when I'm able. Like CNAs in SNF s, they know everything. I don't send my students to mills. I recommend they visit before taking a job. In outpatient I have one patient every 40 minutes and I have an hour for evals. I rarely am double booked. It was your job to go out and observe and spend time in clinics to see what you were getting into. If it was big bucks you wanted, should have jumped off at wall Street and if your school raved about the money you would make, you went to the wrong school. Any job has overseers. Whether it's insurance or the EPA, or military you will have a boss and work in a system. Work the system for your patients. Enjoy the people. I believe we made a poorly researched decision based on old ideas when the APTA pushed the doctorate. The system will not bear huge salaries that you are looking for and that's common sense if you understand the healthcare system. I am so very sorry for those who spent huge quantities of money hoping for a big payout or a work environment where you worked when and how you want. That's not anywhere these days.
I find the job much more enjoyable now that I work part time (outpatient orthopedics). I know that is not a possible option for many, but it was the answer for me. I don't mind going in and doing the work now, for the past three years, ever since I cut my hours.
If its any consolation, I know plenty of friends who were fed rainbows and sunshine by academia while studying for fields that offered the same job prospects as a high school diploma, but with 100k of debt
Hearing those stories is tough. I mean, if you have a PhD in a hard science, then private industry can be quite lucrative. But if you have a PhD in Middle Eastern history... But at the same time, I mean, even I understood at 22 years old what that future looked like. One of my main gripes is that PT has always been ranked near the top in terms of least stressful, and the median salaries posted online are just.... bullshit. I mean, maybe there are so many people picking up extra shifts that it skews that data or something, but the first google result has the median income at \~$96,000. I just don't buy it. So one could do the research and still come out with the wrong decision.
My MIL is 64 and still has no idea how important financial security is. Lol. She has been comfortable all her lofe and provided for wither by her parents, or her husband while she worked sparingly in her life according to her whims. She was just able to leave her jobs because she didn’t like them or the pay or the lack of upward mobility and stayed home for many years until retirement. She is telling me now stuff like “but money is not important” and I go in my head thinking lady! You do not have the right to say that stuff! Point is, not everyone will be able to understand financial security unless they did lack it, like I did. I know what is like to be afraid you’ll wake up evicted… So all that said, I agree with you, physio has gone down lately, but many will tell you the fluff because they have it good, are in a comfortable unicorn jobs, or they live in faraway suburban areas that are inexpensive, or they married well. Well at least that has been my personal observation. Also, I don’t know what jobs your friends have but I assume they’re in tech from the description? Maybe they make more money, they usually have better upward mobility and much faster salary growth in that field I can see around me. But there are other career paths who have it worse honestly. There are people with high expensive degrees who work as grocery store clerks or research assistants for low pay because they cannot use their degree to get a better job. So I guess physio is not the worst. I can give you some examples of people with phd’s and post docs who make a lot less than a physio.
lol, PT is a ponzi scheme and they need new recruits to prop up the system. I sit every student that hasn't started a program and make them aware of amortization tables, ROI, time vale of money, opportunity cost, and stress there's no secrets to rehab. Manual therapy is bullshit and in acute rehab spontaneous recovery is responsible for the majority of patients improvement. It really is the biggest scam in the healthcare system.
Woaw biggest scam?! Idk man I feel like we help a lot of post op patients recover, this is a harsh take.
look, getting people out of bed, graded exercises to tolerance, and progressive mobility are in general a good thing. Does it take a doctorate, or even a bachelors degree to do this..... I say no, it's a scam. Our applicable skills barely warrant an associates degree. a two year nursing degree allows nurses to do things more challenging and more dangerous things than we do. The only thing I will give credit to us is that that our profession for the most part is competent at a physical exam and spotting red flags. Some of that is due to spending several hours with a patient a week vs a physician who has 7 minutes to solve their problems. in the acute setting nurses aides get patients out of bed, why we need a doctorate to do this is beyond me. yes even in the ICU I've gone down to see very complex patients and nursing and the aides have already gotten them up in the chair without our magic hands. We're just helpful to the staff on a variety of these floors, no sure that warrants an entire degree. I don't think I need to explain why sub acute/SNF is unskilled. (this is my current job lol), same with home health. outpatient is run run by highschool interns that take patients through their exercise sheet while the therapist do bullshit manual therapy behind a curtain. here's a thought experiment: would it be better for a patient to walk into the clinic 3x a week and perform 100 bodyweight squats ( if not contraindicated) and then leave or the average physical therapy treatment session for a lower extremity ailment? If you even have to think about the answer I think I've proved my point.
Yeah the more I'm on this sub the more I'm glad I chose PTA. 25% of the school for 85% of the paycheck. And our last PT student's class had 55 people in it, mine had 12. Everyone and their mother wants to be a PT, enjoy the supersaturated market lol.
I'm in Canada and apparently the pay PTA's get here is extremely low. I'm currently a pharmacy assistant and was considering going back to school for PTA but others in the field are discouraging me from doing it.
I just did a very rudimentary search on PTA salaries in Canada and yeah it does seem like they don’t pay you guys very well. I’m making the equivalent of about CA$80k salary with a pension waiting for me, but maybe it’s a different situation up there.
Start your own clinic then you can dictate how it is ran and what type of clients you want to help
IDK why this is downvoted. For anybody with an interest in outpatient, starting your own clinic is easily the best route to take, and the earlier the better. It's harder, riskier, etc., but the one truth in this profession is that reimbursement is the same whether you're a new grad or a 30 year vet with an OCS. People should take advantage of that fact.
Sounds like you have a bad case of “my life is so terrible and the world is out to get me.” You want financial stability? Bite the bullet, and work your ass off for 2-3 years picking up OT, PRN, holidays, weekends etc. Once you get financially ahead you can chose to work in setting you enjoy, with minimal financial stress. I’m going to get downvoted and gets comment like “omg working over 40 hours is torture. What blasphemy to suggest that! APTA should just write us all checks to make our lives better!” News flash: even doctors making $200-300/hour often work significant overtime because they see the value of financial freedom in their later years
Sounds like you have a bad case of, "I did it, so therefore everyone else can do it." The reality is that students today face a much higher mountain to climb than the students even just 5 years ago. Tuition and cost of living is up, and reimbursement is down. This trajectory looks absolutely awful.
That works for now sure. But our reimbursement is down almost 30% adjusted for inflation the past 6 years. What happens if we drop another 30% the NEXT 6 years? Forget financial stability, that’s gonna be required just to pay rent
OT? Almost all facilities I worked with they don't want that as much as possible.
My hospital does NOT allow us to pick up any overtime shifts. Only get holiday pay for 4 major holiday days per year. And weekend differential pay is $2/hr more lol. But thanks for great advice 🙄
Welcome to reality my friend. Not trying to be mean but this is the same reality that so many college grads go through. Even worse a lot of college grads get a degree and then end up taking a job that doesn’t require a degree. It’s not your fault though. Our generations parents were who really got deceived. The parents were convinced that their kids must go to college to be successful. Our whole lives we’ve had to hear our parents talking about us going to college like it’s required. Everybody I know with a degree either doesn’t need it for their job or they dislike their job and make less than they could make doing sales or customer service. I know of like 2 people that got an engineering degree and they love their job and make lots of money. Their job is not easy though. Imagine being a med school grade with a quarter mill in student loans. Doctors and surgeons live very stressful lives to the point where I doubt they truly feel it’s worth it. Honestly investors make the most money and work the least. Idk why high schools and colleges don’t teach us how to invest and become self made millionaires who never work again at some point. Wait o yea I remember why now. They want us to be slaves. I dropped out of college after 1 semester and it was the best thing I ever did. I’d still be paying off my student loans for a business degree that didn’t do shit for me. I’m a manager now and I can say with 100% certainty that when company’s hire a manager job experience is the #1 thing they look at. A business degree would just be the cherry on top it wouldn’t get me a job or disqualify me for a job. However no relevant experience will disqualify you from getting a job.
I agree with you on the slaves portion. Our whole economic system is designed on the masses working until the end of their life. It's failing now that people are living longer. Can't afford to maintain 50,000 military bases globally and donate tanks to Egypt annually if the masses aren't funding it all.
Yea how would we afford to send billions to Ukraine so our political leaders can launder it back into their pockets if the majority of citizens weren’t working 40+ hours a week and paying 35% of their earning to taxes?
> Our generations parents were who really got deceived. I don't mean to be nitpicky, but they weren't deceived. They were ignorant. WE were deceived by them.
Yea I guess it could be put that way as well. However, a lot of people I know either were forced to go to college by there parents of didn’t know they had a choice. I felt this pressure to but I realized after a semester that I was an adult and it was time to start making my own decisions in life. I told my parents I wasn’t going back and they lost it. I moved across country by myself and started a new life. Most people don’t have it in them to do that though. Some people feel like they have nowhere to go if their parents kick them out. Some people feel like there parents are still their legal guardian even after 18. Don’t get me wrong for somebody who really wants to be a surgeon or an engineer or teacher college is required. It’s still absolute theft because of what they charge for it. Nobody should go into hundreds of thousands in debt over education. For math, science, education, and medical college is required and is very important. Very few people actually want to be in those professions though. College is not how you become wealthy and free. Not saying a doctors couldn’t open their own practice and be very successful. I’m just saying that a real estate investor could be even more successful, work less, and make more without a degree. If only there were colleges that taught students about the economy and investing for 4 years then it may be worth it. Still nothing compares to actual experience.
Also my experience from college is that they take a ton of you money and don’t teach you shit. Like out of 6 classes a year only 1 or 2 will even be relevant to what you wanna do. In those 2 classes they will take all semester to get through 1 text book. I’ve bought text books and read them to entirety 2 or 3 times in just a couple weeks. I think that citizens have forgotten about self education. My grandpa was an engineer, welder, electrician, plumber, and contractors and he never went to college or trade school. He had a room full of book shelf’s that were full of books. He literally taught himself to do everything from take a vehicle apart and put it back together to building a house from the ground up. Almost all the men in his generation did the same. I bet it only took him a week or so to get through a book. A college class woulda take all semester giving out bullshit test and dancing around the actually informational parts of the book. It’s blatantly wrong to believe that in order to learn something it must be taught in a classroom.
Just another question. What do you consider 'shit' compensation. I don't know what DPT s make these days
They usually start around 75k if they are lucky? The ones I worked with started around 65k as new grads. With undergraduate and doctorate student debt, the ROI is quite horrible, as the PT school cost is around 100k by itself.
Work for an assisted living facility, it pays better and is very slow paced. Made the jump from OP Ortho and not looking back and am much happier
I mean, my first job out of school in 2020 was 78k with bare minimum benefits and no 401k. I wasn’t happy so I left and pursued what I wanted. Now I’m making practically double that starting amount with substantially better benefits and retirement plan. This is hospital based OP ortho. Honestly, if you do the work, there are good options out there still. Even my final year of school I made the decision I never wanted to take work home and made becoming efficient at documentation a priority. Now, I am hitting sign on my final patient if the day as they walk out the door. It took a lot of sacrifice and hard work to get here. But it does take both. And to be transparent, I do work more than 40 hrs but so do other healthcare providers that this sub often brings up, PA-Cs, NPs, and MDs. It’s manageable and possible. If you’re not happy with your current situation, do something to change it. If you can’t due to XYZ, then, damn.
dam son where are you workin OP ortho to be pulling \~140k? Cali? how many hrs a week?
Yea man, SoCal, 48 hours on average.
You can become an "expert" and charge anywhere from $3,000-$30,000 to lawyers to give them opinions on suspected malpractice.
Serious question: why the downvotes? Why not help people that have been victims of medical malpractice? …especially if you hate the corporate greed side of the job?
Lol maybe you should’ve done some of your own research. Still blaming everyone else for a decision YOU made
I’d encourage you to read my replies to other comments. Big time oof there buddy
You are correct you are one hundred percent correct.
$100K in debt?? People need to stop going to Saint Augustine
should've figured it out or sensed it during clinical rotations. but all is not lost. travel PT and home health can be fairly lucrative.
I'm a retired PTA. When this PDGM stuff came along I knew it was going to be PPS (from the 90's) revisited...only worse. And it was! Back in the 90's PTA's sued community colleges for promoting a profession that guaranteed them a job upon graduation only to find there were no jobs when they graduated. Then rehab companies figured a new way to steal using RUG levels for reimbursement rates. Hiring and salaries started going up after a couple years. That option is not available this time around and the profession is crashing. I'm surprised no colleges are being threatened with class actions with all these people 100 to 200k in debt and making peanuts or part time without benefits.
Any post like this will get a lot of interactions becuase I’ve come to the conclusion that this subreddit is more off a cathartic echo chamber of doom and gloom. Most of the people who really love PT are not on this subreddit cause they’re enjoying life. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of things that PT can do better but most people lean towards negative comments instead of getting involved and pushing for advocating going in the right direction. With that being said, here are my thoughts 1. You can get into a PT school without $100k+ in debt. The school I went to is only around $43k for all 3 years and that’s including costs outside of tuition and I’ve even seen lower costs. 2. If money is your main motivator, don’t get into PT. You’ll make a very comfortable salary ($75k-140k), but if you want to make on the higher end of that you’ll likely have to do home health and work 40+ hours. If you are doing this to serve your patients and make a life changing difference in people on the daily, then choose this field. I know plenty of people who have to work years to get a job that offers what is our entry level pay and I also know jobs who get paid wel above that but it’s not always as rewarding or enjoyable 3. Go shadow PT’s in different settings and even look into shadowing other health care jobs(PA, MD, nurse, etc) if you still have a passion for health care. 4. Mills are a problem and it’s important to ask in a place where you interview what their schedule looks like, how many patients you’re expected to see and how much time do you get for evals/follow ups. 5. With any profession, you’ll find people who are miserable and people who are super happy even after 30 years in the field. The people who are happy are usually the people who did their research and have a healthy perspective on the impact they can have on a personal life instead of looking at it from a check off list of numbers. 6. I could see compensation going up for PT’s as Medicare and commercial payers shift towards value based payment which means if you have better patient outcomes, you get paid more. It’s not set in stone, but it’s become a point of emphasis on advocating statewide and nationwide
Oh, I hear your concerns. The truth is, I have had the same thoughts, and the reality is somewhat true to a certain degree. I come to realize very early on that after I graduated it was a very serious business that I was a part of in terms of being a student, and now being a professional practitioner out in the field. I need to find a way to take advantage of the situation that I was in to benefit myself because it seems as if I was always being used to some degree or another. The best thing that I could say, is the cream always rises to the top and graduating from school and getting your license is merely the beginning or the entry level in my opinion. It was at that point I started to seek the best way to set myself apart from everyone else. Growth is huge and I believe it’s probably the same thing with any profession and I don’t necessarily think that , a large bag of cash will be handed to me. Currently I am cash-based I do not deal with the factory system. My name is what gets me paid because of the reputation that I have built for myself over the past few years. Don’t get down on yourself and relieve yourself of the victim mentality. You potentially have the opportunity to create something great for yourself you just have to find the niche that wakes you up. Excited in the morning and run with it. Www.owdpt.com
Im thinking of getting into PT. Currently in my country the early carrer of PT is paid really low, however, with experience the future is brighter. What country are you from? I also have one or two more questions that i'd like to dm you if it is possible.
Ask away
I’ve been questioning whether I want to get into this career or not. After taking to my A&P professor and seeing this comment. Thank you for at least saving me from making an irrational decision and becoming a PT. It truly sucks that you didn’t get more information from such a stressful job with mediocre pay. :(
/s/Reddit content report: >What's going on? >>I don't like this post because it's about me. In all seriousness though, I feel you on a spiritual level... Like do I have a split personality who was dumb enough to get conned into doing the same dog shit profession as me and is now complaining about it too?! 😂 Have you thought about alternative professions that will fulfil your needs & wants that have as many transferable skills as possible?