Doctor Salaries reports what official surveys say about physician and specialist pay, and the costs and years of training that lead to it. This page explains where the numbers come from, how we check them and what we leave out.
Sources we use
We use primary sources only: BLS OEWS wage estimates and the Occupational Outlook Handbook; O*NET OnLine (U.S. Department of Labor); the AAMC for medical school tuition, cost of attendance, debt and resident stipends; ACGME program requirements for residency length; the American Board of Radiology for board exam steps and fees; NRMP for Match data; PAEA for PA program costs; the U.S. Department of Education and Federal Student Aid for loan limits and rates; and the IRS and Social Security Administration for tax rules. Private physician compensation surveys are not used for any figure BLS publishes. The one exception is a specialty BLS does not report separately (neurosurgery, plastic surgery): there we quote the Doximity 2026 Physician Compensation Report as a labeled survey result, with its sample and method, next to the BLS group that contains the specialty, and compare it only with figures from the same survey.
How calculators are checked
The take-home, school-cost and loan calculators run the same code that builds our tables, and automated tests check known answers: the 2026 IRS brackets and standard deduction, the Social Security wage base, loan payments against the standard amortization formula, and the federal loan limits that apply from July 1, 2026. Every salary in a table comes from BLS data, either the BLS public data API or O*NET’s republished BLS tables, and a test checks the national figures against the API pulls. Inputs outside a sensible range (for example a 401(k) share above 50% or an interest rate above 20%) are limited and flagged, never turned into a negative result.
What we will not publish
- Affiliate links, refinancing or lender offers, paid school listings, recruiter referrals or lead forms.
- Salary figures from job boards, recruiters or anonymous self-reports, or private survey figures presented as official data.
- Our own estimate of a specialty’s pay where no source reports it; we say the figure does not exist instead.
- Claims about a specialty, school or employer that we cannot trace to a dated primary source.
Updates and corrections
Every page shows its last update date, and wage tables name the BLS survey month (May 2025). BLS publishes new OEWS wage estimates each spring; the IRS sets tax brackets each fall; the AAMC updates tuition, debt and stipend data each year; federal loan rates reset each July. We refresh the data and re-run the tests when they do, and change page dates only when content changes. If a number looks wrong, send the page address and the source you are comparing with through the contact page; we check it against the primary source and correct the page, noting material changes.