Medical Doctor Salary … not as high as you think?!
Recently I’m curious about the average annual income for physicians in Canada. I mean how high can their incomes go? I did a search online but came across numerous results unsatisfactorily. Some websites use data that are decade old; some use data without any real statistics; some use data that are based on individual inputs.
I was about to give up my search, till I found the following information from BC government website. Mission accomplished. 
Although the statistics is for BC, it can be used as a guide for the rest of Canada.
Ophthalmology, GI, Cardio, and Radiology are medical specialists among the highest earning groups with annual incomes as high as more than $600,000. That’s pretty impressive. What an eye opener! After working for 2 years, they are already millionaires!!! Education definitely pays off in this field. Maybe I should consider a career change?!?! 
However, as far as I know, ophthalmology is one of the toughest medical specialties to get into. The number of medical students trained in this field is usually in single digit per year. 
So, would you consider a career in medicine? Recession-proof for sure!
Salaries for Medical Practitioners in British Columbia Year 2007-2008
* Yellow = median annual salary
* Reference: BC Health
| Specialty | <10k | 10k to 49k |
50k to 99k |
100k to 199k |
200k to 299k |
300k to 399k |
400k to 599k |
>600k |
| General Physician | 359 | 551 | 619 | 1,446 | 1,224 | 452 | 145 | 10 |
| Dermatologist | 4 | 4 | 7 | 10 | 11 | 13 | 13 | 2 |
| Neurologist | 3 | 13 | 13 | 21 | 24 | 11 | 13 | 1 |
| Psychiatrist | 25 | 68 | 123 | 261 | 120 | 32 | 8 | 0 |
| Obstetrician & Gynaecologist | 16 | 20 | 15 | 38 | 49 | 42 | 32 | 9 |
| Ophthalmologist | 6 | 7 | 8 | 18 | 13 | 18 | 36 | 73 |
| General Surgeon | 7 | 15 | 11 | 27 | 41 | 49 | 52 | 10 |
| Neurosurgeon | 1 | 2 | 1 | 6 | 2 | 10 | 9 | 5 |
| Orthopaedic Surgeon | 8 | 20 | 16 | 31 | 49 | 47 | 31 | 2 |
| Plastic Surgeon | 5 | 9 | 7 | 15 | 23 | 11 | 4 | 2 |
| Cardiac Surgeon | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 5 | 5 | 8 | 2 |
| Urologist | 2 | 7 | 5 | 8 | 7 | 21 | 23 | 8 |
| Paediatrician | 29 | 36 | 28 | 50 | 51 | 20 | 13 | 1 |
| Internal Medicine | 15 | 40 | 24 | 34 | 44 | 37 | 26 | 6 |
| Radiologist | 5 | 13 | 2 | 23 | 24 | 22 | 52 | 140 |
| Laboratory Medicine | 15 | 11 | 4 | 9 | 4 | 2 | 9 | 72 |
| Specialty | <10k | 10k to 49k |
50k to 99k |
100k to 199k |
200k to 299k |
300k to 399k |
400k to 599k |
>600k |
| Anesthesiologist | 19 | 39 | 37 | 96 | 166 | 82 | 22 | 0 |
| Paediatric Cardiologist | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 0 |
| Physical Medicine | 9 | 12 | 8 | 13 | 9 | 5 | 1 | 0 |
| Geriatric Medicine | 2 | 6 | 8 | 11 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Cardiologist | 0 | 3 | 5 | 7 | 4 | 12 | 30 | 40 |
| Emergency Medicine | 18 | 8 | 3 | 9 | 4 | 8 | 0 | 0 |
| Medical Microbiologist | 0 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 8 |
| Nuclear Medicine | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 18 |
| Rheumatologist | 1 | 3 | 4 | 17 | 16 | 9 | 3 | 0 |
| Clinical Immunologist | 1 | 1 | 0 | 5 | 4 | 6 | 7 | 2 |
| Medical Genetics | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Vascular Surgeon | 0 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 12 | 10 | 0 |
| Thoracic Surgeon | 3 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 4 | 1 |
| Respirologist | 1 | 5 | 5 | 13 | 15 | 19 | 10 | 6 |
| Endocrinologist | 1 | 2 | 8 | 9 | 18 | 7 | 1 | 0 |
| Gastroenterologist | 2 | 2 | 3 | 6 | 8 | 13 | 27 | 10 |
| Nephrologist | 2 | 3 | 8 | 10 | 8 | 8 | 20 | 4 |
| Infectious Diseases | 3 | 7 | 3 | 10 | 5 | 2 | 1 | 2 |
| Hematology Oncologist | 2 | 8 | 7 | 9 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 1 |
| Total | 569 | 928 | 991 | 2231 | 1973 | 1000 | 638 | 442 |
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I wonder how many hours a week they work. Overtime? On-call?
thats not very high. i earn way more than that.
How come some docs make less than 10k?
@grillmonster, I don’t know why some doctors earn less, because BC government site doesn’t state any reasons.
I suppose, it could also be due to maternity leaves, new doctors, student interns, etc.
They’re dead losers. LOL
i never thought doctors make more than 600k per year. thats encouragin. im thinking about applying to med schools after finishing my engineering degree.
Salaries for any physician that has finished his/her residency will generally be 100k-300k for the first 5 years. The most common salaries are 120k-250k depending on the speciality. For salaries that are more than 300k there usually is a good reason. Reasons can include things like high overhead cost, high malpractice insurance, extensive hours, high liability, high risk, very heavy scheduling, fast cycling of patients (i.e. having to average interpreting 40+ radiograph results from 20 patients an hour, vs. seeing 2+ patients an hour for general counselling), very limited number of people in the profession due to extensively long study-time (including res, fellowship + other), or private practise.