Infectious Diseases Physician in USA: Low Salaries & Good Chances for IMGs

If you are looking for intellectual challenge and wide range of career options – think about Infectious Diseases. It’s a highly rewarding specialty with a historic place in American medicine. And if you are International Medical Graduate, notice that Infectious Diseases is not a very competitive specialty, as it’s not very popular among American medical students. That's why you have good chances for getting in.


What is the Salary of an Infectious Diseases Physician in USA?

Median mid-career level physician salaries figure samples look low as compared to the more sought post-Internal medicine specialties like Cardiology and Gastroenterology.

Houston, TX: 178,000/-
Los Angeles, CA: 190,000/-
Miami, FL: 170,000/-
New York, NY : 200,000/-
Seattle, WA: 188,000/-
National Average: $168,000/-

Not surprising, therefore, that a lot of fellowship spots in Internal Medicine often go vacant each year. This has been concerning the US Government and has stepped up measures to encourage medical students to think Infectious Disease (ID), in the wake of the recent spate of Infectious disease scares in the form of Bioterrorism attacks, SARS, the West Nile threat, recent E.coli outbreaks, etc.

Docs with a love for public health might surely find Infectious disease a rewarding career to have.

How to Become an Infectious Disease Physician in the USA ?

A 2 or 3 year fellowship program in Infectious Disease ( Programs may offer both research-intensive or clinical-intensive tracks) makes you an 'ID specialist'.

As commented before, it is not as competitive as fellowships in Cardiology or Gastroenterology would be, even for the International Medical Graduates. Some sample programs requirements to look at University of Florida, Jacksonville and Yale University. Some programs like the Virginia Commonwealth University may even offer further training in Clinical Trials, Hospital Infection management, pediatric infectious diseases,etc. Clinical Trials liason with pharma companies could mean exciting research and big bucks - like Dr. Steven Sperber who will be trying out the effectiveness of a Canadian dietary supplement COLD-fX® to see if it can boost immunity to common cold viruses.