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Physician Contract Glossary · Compensation

Bonus Structure

A bonus structure is the part of a physician contract that defines what you must do to earn pay above your base, and how that extra pay is calculated.

Your bonus structure is everything in the contract that pays you on top of your base salary. The most common trigger is production: you hit a wRVU or collections threshold, and you earn a set rate on everything above it. Other bonuses are tied to quality metrics, patient satisfaction scores, or simply staying through a date. The two questions that matter are what triggers the bonus and how the rate is calculated, because a generous-looking bonus on top of an unreachable threshold pays you nothing.

WHAT TO WATCH FOR

Get the exact threshold and the exact rate in writing, and ask what the average physician in the group actually earns against it. A threshold set above what the practice's patient volume can realistically support is a base salary dressed up as an incentive.

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Stop being recruited. Start choosing.

You are about to sign something the senior people in your program signed without reading.

They had no guide either. You do. Start with the option that costs you nothing: see every practice that is actually out there before anyone hands you a contract.

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